Soto’s Swing And Swag Will Be Missed, But Yankees Have Means To Pivot Into A More Complete Team
About 40 days after losing the 2024 World Series to the Dodgers, the Yankees finished second again in a different kind of competition on Sunday night.
The Mets reportedly won the bidding war for free agent outfielder Juan Soto, who had brought his swag and sweet swing to Yankee Stadium following the December 2023 trade with San Diego, thereby lifting a decent but somewhat moribund club to its first Fall Classic appearance in 15 years. As he had always said he would do, Soto took the highest offer, which was the 15-year, $765 million (with no reported deferrals, a $75 million signing bonus, and an opt-out after five seasons) deal from the Mets.
The bones in George Steinbrenner’s grave just cracked in pain.
Like many things in life, things change. Whereas the House of Steinbrenner once lured the grandest of all baseball players to the Bronx with contracts beyond their wildest dreams, some new owners now have the wherewithal and gumption to outspend the storied Yankees franchise. When the Wilpon’s ran the Mets? Signing Soto would have been inconceivable. After billionaire hedge fund executive Steve Cohen bought the club, though, fantasies of acquiring such an exorbitant asset became reality.
As one who grew up a Yankees fan and despised the bandwagon that rode along with the Mets’ brief rise to glory in the mid-1980s, I should feel angered that Soto swapped boroughs. In truth, I will mostly miss the entertainment value in every Soto at-bat. He took his battles with pitchers to an art form, moving around the batter’s box like a dancer and adding an emphasis to his keen eye for the strike zone on takes.
Make no mistake, Soto’s durability and production cannot be replicated. Last season, he played 157 games and hit 41 homers with an on base percentage of .419 and a slugging percentage of .569. His 128 runs scored led the American League. In the postseason, Soto continued to mash, sporting the team’s highest batting average, OPS, and runs scored while going yard four times in 14 games.
The lefty Soto, 26, was the perfect complement to centerfielder Aaron Judge, who slugged 58 homers mostly hitting behind Soto. The MLB Network analysis noted that Judge had never seen so many pitches in the strike zone in previous seasons because he had Soto on base so often in 2024. Mets fans have every reason to be excited about a Francisco Lindor/Soto 1-2 punch at the top of the order every day.
So long as MLB doesn’t follow through on the stupid “Golden At-Bat” idea they leaked, however, the game requires more than a single superstar hitter for a team to succeed. I don’t think the Yankees always appreciated that premise. They just had not one but two of the three best players in the world and still got smoked by a deeper Dodgers squad.
Apparently, the Yankees had an offer in hand for Soto to the tune of $760 million but for 16 years, lowering the AAV to $47.5 million versus the Mets’ $51 million proposal. Theoretically, Yankees General Manager Brian Cashman can now take that budget allocation and use it to shore up the many other weak links in the team’s chain, such as first base, left field, and, as always, the pitching, both starting and the bullpen. No one should expect rookie Jasson Dominguez to be the next Soto, but if he can stay healthy and provide some semblance of consistency at the plate and in the outfield, his daily presence on a relatively inexpensive contract could allow Cashman to spend even more on other needs.
There are rumors as to where the Yankees will pivot—wouldn’t it be something if Mets free agent first baseman Pete Alonso booked the reverse subway ride from Flushing—but Brad Pitt’s “Billy Beane character in “Moneyball” had it right: The Yankees should look to replace Soto in the aggregate.
And if they do it right (by no means a guarantee), they can come out of this dark cloud with a more complete team with a brighter future.