Juan Soto snubs Yankees, signs historic $765 million contract with the Mets
The wait is over! Juan Soto agreed to a massive 15-year $765 million contract with the Mets and our experts are here to break it down.
Sports Pulse
It’s Day 2 of the MLB Winter Meetings in Dallas and it figures to be another fun-filled day of rumors, possible signings and trades.
Pitchers Corbin Burnes and Max Fried, third baseman Alex Bregman and first baseman Pete Alonso are among the top free agents still remaining on the market. Is this the day they agree to a new deal?
The Minnesota Twins are facing payroll restrictions this offseason and have received calls for All-Star shortstop Carlos Correa. In Houston, Astros general manager Dana Brown said he is willing to listen to any offers to trade for outfielder Kyle Tucker and pitcher Framber Valdez.
“We’ll listen on anybody,” he said. “We’re not trying to aggressively move anybody out the door … If it doesn’t make sense, we wouldn’t do it.”
Keep it here for all the news from today’s meetings:
Blake Treinen is officially returning to the World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
The right-handed reliever and the Dodgers agreed to a two-year deal worth $22 million. Treinen, 36, went 7-3 with a 1.93 ERA in 50 games last season and starred in the postseason, appearing in nine games, allowing just three runs in 12.1 innings.
Veteran Washington Post writer elected to Hall of Fame
Thomas Boswell, longtime baseball reporter and columnist at the Washington Post, has been voted the 2025 winner of the BBWAA Career Excellence Award, which is presented annually to a sportswriter “for meritorious contributions to baseball writing.” He will be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame the weekend of July 25-28 in Cooperstown, New York.
With Minnesota coming off a disappointing season, followed by an announcement from the Pohlad family that they will be exploring a sale of the franchise, the Twins are willing to listen to any ideas to ease the payroll. And one of the names that has been swirling is All-Star shortstop Carlos Correa.
“We get calls on a lot of our players,” president of baseball operations Derek Falvey said Monday. “Some, we have to listen; we have to hear the conversation. Some go absolutely nowhere, but they’re the guys that you would expect teams to call on. So in light of the team sale situation, some of the dynamics around our roster otherwise, I think there’s enough teams kind of checking in.
“And what we tell every team is: Listen, we’re open to being creative. We can’t rule anything out before we hear it, no matter who the player is, and so we’ll just be respectful of their process and what they’re going through and try to kick some creative ideas around. It’s what led us to a Pablo (López) trade, or something like that, at different junctures. So we have to stay open-minded to those things.”
Yet, while the Twins may be listening to offers, trading Correa would be very difficult. He has four guaranteed years left on his contract and is owed more than $130 million, plus four club options.
Cardinals president of baseball operations John Mozeliak said he is looking to ‘reset’ the club after a disappointing 2024 season − and that could include trading 10-time Gold Glove winner Nolan Arenado.
“It’s my intention to try,” Mozeliak said Monday.
“We both remain optimistic that both parties will remain happy somehow. (Arenado remaining with the Cardinals) is a possibility, but I’m not sure that puts us where we want to be. From a financial standpoint of trying to move our payroll – there are certainly other ways to do that, but [trading Arenado] would be a big help. It’s financial, but it also creates a runway for someone else.”
The 33-year-old is coming off the worst season of his career, hitting just 16 homers with 71 RBI and a .719 OPS in 152 games. Arenado is due $74 million over the next three seasons – with the Rockies covering $10 million of that as part of the 2021 deal that sent him to St. Louis.
Juan Soto and Blake Snell, the top two players in USA TODAY Sports’ 2024-25 free agent rankings, are now off the board but there’s elite talent remaining on the market expected to fetch big deals.
Here are the top 10 players still on the market:
- SP Corbin Burnes
- 3B Alex Bregman
- 1B Pete Alonso
- SP Max Fried
- OF Teoscar Hernández
- OF Anthony Santander
- INF Gleyber Torres
- SP Nathan Eovaldi
- SP Jack Flaherty
- RP Tanner Scott
DALLAS — This is the exact spot where it happened, turning the baseball world upside down, leaving executives fuming, and publicly threatening that it would forever ruin the sport.
The date: Dec. 11, 2000. The time: 1:30 a.m. The location: Room 633, Anatole Hotel, Dallas, Texas.
It was the moment the Texas Rangers agreed to a 10-year, $252 million contract with shortstop Alex Rodriguez.”How can I forget?” said former Rangers GM Doug Melvin. “How can anyone forget?”
Now, 24 years later, at this same hotel, history repeated itself. This time, it’s Juan Soto signing a record 15-year, $765 million contract with the New York Mets.
And once again, particularly from the small- and mid-sized markets, you could hear screaming into the Texas night, and cries that the sport is broken – worrying about a work stoppage in 2026.
Scott Boras, the man who negotiated A-Rod’s contract and now Soto’s, can only laugh and will tell you it’s a shrewd business deal that will only enhance the franchise’s value.
“I think the process was very misunderstood,” Boras told USA TODAY Sports of the Rodriguez pursuit. “When you look at the surplus value, even though the Rangers didn’t win, it was economically beneficial to the franchise. It was definitely team-friendly.”
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