On Thursday, the Mets held an introductory news conference for Juan Soto, the most sought after free agent of the offseason, after he signed a massive deal to join the Mets for the next 15 years.
The moment was a seminal one in the history of the franchise, not only for landing the most notable free agent available, but for signing him to a record-breaking contract worth $765 million which is the biggest contract in professional sports history.
Mets owner Steve Cohen illuminated more on how the deal got done and said “it wasn’t an easy process.”
“There were so many emotions, it took about 10 days and just so many emotions to get to where we got to, but I always say it’s not how you start, it’s how you finish,” Cohen said. “And we got there.”
“He added: “There were a bunch of times where I kind of felt like we were swimming upstream, wasn’t sure if we were gonna get to the promised land. Even the night of the agreement, I was having dinner with a friend at a restaurant in Florida and I walked out to take a call, came back and said ‘I don’t think we’re getting him.’
“So then about a half hour later, it turned completely around and all of a sudden I realized ‘wow, we’re not that far apart, this may happen.’ And so that’s pretty emotional in a very short period of time.”
The process began with New York’s contingent – consisting of Cohen, president of baseball operations David Stearns, manager Carlos Mendoza and others – meeting with Soto and his agent Scott Boras in California. The meeting took place at Cohen’s Beverly Hills mansion which Soto called “really, really nice” on Thursday, as he said with a laugh.
There, the Mets made their pitch to the outfielder.
However, many other teams, including the Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers and Blue Jays, were interested in Soto’s services and a bidding war ensued.
“This was a competitive process,” Cohen said. “There were many teams involved and it was hard to know where you stood and it was a moving target, right? Things were changing by the day, and so there were moments when you start questioning whether you’re gonna be successful at this. But in the end, I got the call I wanted.”
After their initial meeting, Cohen requested a second meeting with Soto, one to be able to get to know him better as a person.
“If I was gonna commit that type of money, I wanted to feel like this was gonna work,” Cohen said. “And after the second meeting I knew this could really be good for both of us.”
Ultimately, New York had the highest bid and got its guy, but it was also the Mets’ pitch and their plans for the future that sold Soto to join them in Queens.
“What they showed me, how the organization runs things and how they’re gonna manage things and how they look at their future I think is one of the things that opened my eyes a little bit more,” Soto said.
Soto also added that he was impressed by how “hungry” the Mets are to winning a championship and to creating a “dynasty” in New York. In fact, at one of their meetings Soto asked Cohen how many championships he wants to win in the next decade and the Mets owner told him 2-4.
“I’m so happy to become a part of this, the dynasty that they want to create now and for the future,” Soto said. “It’ll be 15 years that I’ll be here, God willing, trying to win the most championships that we can and trying to come out on top every day.”
Of course, Soto decided to leave the Yankees and join the Mets which is an unprecedented move, but speaks to the volume of what has begun to happen with Cohen as the owner.
After the news conference, Soto was asked about leaving the Bronx and joining the crosstown rivals.
“I don’t think it was the Mets over the Yankees,” Soto said. “I think it was five teams that we had right there on the table. I don’t think it had anything to do with the Mets or the Yankees, I think we had all five teams pushing until the last moment.”
He added: “I feel like [the Yankees] did everything that they had in their power to bring me back, but I had four other teams doing the same thing and trying to make me feel comfortable. At the end of the day, we look at everything, we look at the chances and we look at what other teams want to do for the next 15 years and I think we have the best chance to win here.”