NEW YORK — When the Mets originally offered Pete Alonso a contract extension, Steve Cohen was the owner but a different executive was running the front office. Then-general manager Billy Eppler hoped to lock up Alonso to a long-term deal reported to be $158 million over seven years.
The terms weren’t extraordinary, yet Alonso rejected them.
Just two years later, and three months into free agency, the Mets convinced Alonso to settle for a two-year, $54 million contract — or, about $100 million less in guaranteed money.
A long-term offer was no longer on the table for Alonso because second-year president of baseball operations David Stearns wouldn’t present it to him. Sure, the Polar Bear had a down year in 2024, which made for an underwhelming market in free agency. But he hadn’t dramatically changed as a player. He still hit 34 home runs in the regular season, followed by a .999 OPS in the postseason, including the most memorable home run of his career.
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What did change was Alonso’s age. He turned 30 in December, a number that wasn’t lost on the Mets’ current front office given its historical correlation to a player’s decline.
The Mets always wanted Alonso back, but Stearns wasn’t going to throw around Cohen’s money and flex that financial might just because he could. The deal had to make sense for them now and later. Alonso can take solace in being the highest-paid first baseman in MLB this year, earning a reported $30 million with an opt-out after the season, while the Mets got him to agree to the shorter-term deal they now desired.
”If he performs well, good for him, right? I mean, how fantastic is that,” Steve Cohen told FOX Sports in a phone call on Thursday. “He just has to be Pete. Go do his thing. Hopefully he’s more relaxed. Not saying he wasn’t relaxed. But hopefully he can go focus on what he does, which is baseball, and enjoy the season with his teammates. Let’s go win something.”
The Mets certainly won this negotiation with Alonso.
They simply were not going to budge on a short-term contract, which marks a stark difference from the previous execs working under Cohen. Stearns was given the leeway to lead the negotiations with all free agents, from Juan Soto to Alonso, with Cohen sometimes involved in the process in a supportive role to show players that he cares. With Alonso, a star player he’s known personally since the start of his ownership, Cohen took on a more active role while sticking to Stearns’ direction regarding the terms.
The Alonso deal perfectly embodies the Cohen-Stearns era in Queens thus far. The Mets weren’t sentimental, they didn’t overspend, and they refused to give in to the demands of superagent Scott Boras. Stearns demonstrated his discipline, with Cohen spending where it was necessary.
Since Cohen named Stearns the Mets’ president of baseball operations in October 2023, their partnership has been marked by success. Stearns was the architect behind a reimagined 2024 Mets roster that exceeded all expectations while reaching the National League Championship Series. In December, Cohen and Stearns plucked one of the greatest young hitters in history from the Yankees.
Through 16 months on the job, Stearns has seemingly pushed the right buttons at every turn for the Mets.
“That’s why I hired him,” Cohen said. “He’s very good at what he does. He’s very patient and disciplined and thoughtful and that’s the kind of thing you start to see paying dividends over time. We’re seeing it.”
What we know about Stearns is that he’s a shrewd executive who will rely on the data when making deals. He entered the baseball industry fresh out of Harvard and made his mark by leading the small-market Brewers to four consecutive playoff appearances through savvy deals. That blueprint hasn’t changed since coming over to the big-money Mets. He just has a deeper well to draw from in Cohen, the richest owner in the sport with a net worth of around $20 billion, who actually prefers to follow the lead of the executives he hires.
Since Cohen bought the franchise and became the Mets’ owner in November 2020, he has worked alongside five front-office executives: Sandy Alderson, Jared Porter, Zack Scott, Eppler and Stearns. A hedge-fund CEO and childhood Mets fan, Cohen is still relatively new to the business side of baseball, so he relies heavily on leaders of the front office to guide the club’s financial decisions while building a competitive roster.
Just two years ago, the Mets had the largest payroll in MLB history at roughly $350 million, and they finished in fourth place, well below .500. With Stearns leading team brass, Cohen is beginning to see his vision for the Mets come to fruition.
“We got better as we went along,” Cohen said of the turnover in the front office. “David has a way of doing things that kind of really fits into my philosophy. I totally get where he’s coming from and why he’s doing what he’s doing. I share those philosophies.”
As early as the day he was formally introduced as the Mets’ new owner, Cohen said he wanted to model the Mets after the Dodgers. Specifically, he wanted to achieve sustained success. Such ambition sounded lofty, if not fanciful. But now, entering Year five of his ownership tenure, Cohen’s dream is manifesting.
The Mets’ farm system quickly went from bad to respectable. Their 26-man roster is potent. Between Stearns’ astute ability to add on the margins and Cohen’s resources, they’ll continue taking advantage of opportunities in the marketplace via free agency and trades. If there’s still concern about the Mets’ rotation, just remember that was also the case heading into last season, only for Stearns to prove how great of a talent evaluator he is.
Where the team is incomplete, there is an underlying sense that they’re never done adding to the roster.
Just look at the Mets from 2024 Opening Day compared to where they stood in October, after key minor-league promotions (and demotions), trade-deadline acquisitions, and a budding clubhouse culture that was evident to anyone who watched them take the field.
It sounds a lot like the forces behind the Dodgers’ sustained excellence over the past several years. Similar to Cohen’s commitment to winning at any cost, the Dodgers have the Guggenheim Baseball Management ownership group funding their exorbitant spending. Much like Stearns’ sharp oversight, the Dodgers have esteemed president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman calling the shots.
No wonder, after meeting in the NLCS, the two ballclubs were the two biggest winners of the offseason.
Cohen brought Stearns over to Queens in part to become the East Coast Dodgers. The Mets have roster flexibility. They have shown discipline in free agency. And they have better awareness of short, intermediate and long-term roster implications while satisfying their fan base.
Much of that can be compromised when dealing with a homegrown star. But the Mets chose to play hardball and still managed to make it work for all sides. Welcome to a new era in Queens.
Deesha Thosar is an MLB reporter for FOX Sports. She previously covered the Mets as a beat reporter for the New York Daily News. The daughter of Indian immigrants, Deesha grew up on Long Island and now lives in Queens. Follow her on Twitter at @DeeshaThosar.
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