Mets general manager Sandy Alderson arrived in Orlando for the GM Meetings tonight and got things started with his usual deadpan humor.
“Well, I was upstairs stacking our money. Don’t get too excited. They were all fives.”
When asked how high the stack of five dollar bills go, he responded: “Not as high as some people expect.”
Responding to a direct question, Alderson said he is unlikely to sign any player to a $100 million contract this winter although he intends to be aggressive.
ESPN’s Adam Rubin expanded on this and writes:
The GM said it is simply not practical for a team to have two players with $100 million-plus contracts, although that assertion is debatable given the Mets do play in New York. Regardless, Alderson said, the Mets’ big-ticket contract is David Wright (eight years, $138 million). And that’s it.
So essentially this is not just about whether any player in the current market is worth $100 million as much as it is a philosophical and organizational view that the Mets will not have two players who make as much as Wright does. I thought that was quite an admission to make by Alderson.
“We’ve been in that stratosphere once recently with David Wright,” Alderson said. “Those were special circumstances. I think it would be difficult to duplicate that again — not from a financial standpoint, just in terms of team-building. I think it’s difficult to concentrate those kinds of resources into very few players. It’s not really the way you build a quality, sustainable, winning team, I don’t think.”
This kind of thinking suggests that even lets say a CarGo or Tulo were available, the Mets could not sustain that kind of commitment as long as they have already have an $18 million dollar a year player in Wright.
So it’s not just the totality of $100 million, it’s the $17-18 million average annual value that is the key number. That is Wright Territory and what was said is that the Mets don’t have room for two players making that kind of coin.
Let me break that down further. If Player A wants a $54 million three year deal, that too is a no-go for the Mets. It’s the AAV that Sandy was talking about and not so much the overall size of the deal. So were is the tipping point? Is it $16 million a year or $15 million a year? What is that magic number? Maybe we’ll find out by the time this process is over and we get to see some of the numbers the Mets back away from.
Alderson also shared his thoughts about pursuing any of the 13 free agents that would cost them their second round pick.
He insisted the Mets having a protected first-round pick would allow them to be more active in pursuing free agents who received qualifying offers. However, team insiders told ESPN it’s not likely the Mets will land such a player.
“A second-round pick is still valuable. Many quality major league players come out of that round. So I’m not discounting that at all. But in terms of where we are and balancing the continued growth of our player-development system with the desire to win at the major league level, right now we have the ability to balance those things.”
Day one of the GM Meetings has come and gone, and I’m none the wiser as to this myth that the Mets will spend enough this offseason either in dollars, or prospects, or draft picks.
Lets see what day two brings…
