Good Morning, everyone. I wanted to put together an offseason planner and I included some upcoming important dates to remember. Essentially what follows is a summary I compiled of our 2017 Payroll Commitments, Arbitration Eligible Players and Free Agents, along with some observations and a current payroll projection.
Important Dates
Five days after World Series: Deadline for teams to make qualifying offers to their eligible former players who became free agents
12 days after World Series: Deadline for free agents to accept qualifying offers
Dec. 2: Last day for teams to offer 2017 contracts to unsigned players on their 40-man rosters
Dec. 5-8: Winter Meetings, Washington, D.C.
Dec. 8: Rule 5 Draft
Guaranteed Contracts
David Wright – $20,000,000
Curtis Granderson – $15,000,000
Asdrubal Cabrera – $8,250,000
Juan Lagares – $4,500,000
The Mets have $47,750,000 tied up on these four players.
2017 Team Options
Jay Bruce – $13,000,000 with $1,000,000 buyout
Jon Niese – $10,000,000 with $500,000 buyout
Jose Reyes – $510,000 (MLB minimum)
The Mets are expected to exercise their team options on Jay Bruce and Jose Reyes. However, there’s no chance Jon Niese returns and the Mets will only be responsible for the buyout amount. It’s a safe bet to add $14.1 million to the current projected payroll.
Arbitration Eligible
Josh Edgin – ($500K) $800,000
Jeurys Familia – ($4.1M) $8,800,000
Lucas Duda – ($4.2M) $6,700,000
Matt Harvey – ($4.3M) $5,200,000
Jacob deGrom – ($600K) $4,500,000
Rene Rivera – ($443K) $2,200,000
Addison Reed – ($5.2M) $11,100,000
Wilmer Flores – ($520K) $1,900,000
Travis d’Arnaud – ($540K) $1,700,000
Justin Ruggiano – ($180K) $1,500,000
Jim Henderson – ($507K) $1,400,000
Zack Wheeler – ($546K) $1,000,000
The number in parenthesis represents each player’s 2016 salary while the second number is the projected salary for the 2017 by MLB Trade Rumors. In 2016 these 12 players earned $21.6 million dollars. That number is projected to climb to $46.8 million.
The most significant increases will go to Addison Reed who will get a $5.8 million raise, Jeurys Familia will see his salary increase by $4.7 million, and Jacob deGrom who gets a $3.9 million bump. Lucas Duda, who missed most of the season, will get a $2.5 million raise.
Free Agents – 2015 Salary
Yoenis Cespedes – $27,500,000
Neil Walker – $10,550,000
James Loney – $9,666,667*
Bartolo Colon – $7,250,000
Alejandro De Aza – $5,750,000
Jerry Blevins – $4,000,000
Fernando Salas – $2,400,000
Kelly Johnson $2,000,000
According to reports, the Mets are expected to make Neil Walker a $16.7 million qualifying offer. Aside from Yoenis Cespedes, who the Mets will try to re-sign to a multi-year contract, it’s not yet clear if any of the other players will be returning. I’m betting that Bartolo Colon will return for one more year at roughly $11 million dollars.
So if you were to total the figures from the guaranteed contracts, team options and projected arbitration amounts, we get a total of $108,650,000 in approximate payroll for 18 players. That figure does not include Walker, Cespedes or Colon who would add another roughly $55 million to bring payroll above $160 million..
It leads to a lot of different questions. Do the Mets decide not to pick up the option on Jay Bruce given the outfield logjam? Do the Mets give serious thought to non-tendering Lucas Duda and hope he re-signs for much less than the $6.7 million dollars? Do they reconsider their initial stance of giving Neil Walker a qualifying offer and stick with T.J. Rivera? So many questions, so little time. Stay tuned.
