Steve Cohen is pushing the Mets’ payroll for next season where no MLB owner has gone before.
Scott Boras is among the invested observers who loves to see it.
Brandon Nimmo, who counts Boras as his agent, reaped the rewards last week when he agreed to rejoin the Mets on an eight-year, $162 million contract, part of Cohen’s spending spree that has since taken the Mets’ 2023 luxury-tax payroll to roughly $353 million.
“Our game needs Goliaths,” Boras said Thursday at a press conference at Citi Field to announce Nimmo’s signing. “We have to have Goliaths.
“You can envision Steve Cohen hanging on to the Empire State Building. There he is. And it’s maybe not Steve Cohen, it’s Steve Kong. But when you’re there and you’re looking at it, how good is it for the game? It’s really good for the game.”
And even after spending $461.7 million on six free-agent deals this offseason — adding Justin Verlander, Kodai Senga, Jose Quintana and David Robertson and re-signing Nimmo and Edwin Diaz — the Mets showed Thursday night they were not yet done, signing catcher Omar Narvaez to a one-year, $8 million contract with a $7 million player option for 2024. Further bolstering their bullpen and possibly finding another bat could be next.
Mets owner Steve Cohen at the unveiling of the Tom Seaver statue outside Citi Field on April 15, 2022. Corey SipkinFollowing a 101-win season that ended in an early playoff exit, Cohen and GM Billy Eppler are not resting.
“Certainly [Cohen] lets Billy do his work, but he’s also someone that really gives you a clear picture about what his in-line is as an owner,” Boras said. “There is a real fight in overcoming something that he inherited, that the organizational talent depth has been a problem. He knows he has to do more at the major league and free-agent level to address that. He’s very clear about it.
“[He’s] always trying to make sure that this year’s team is as competitive as it should be, understanding that he has to pull in the free-agent area more than he’d like to.”
The highest luxury-tax threshold for 2023 — the level that has been dubbed the Steve Cohen Tax — is $293 million with a 90 percent surcharge on every penny exceeding that. Even if the Mets don’t go any further this offseason, that would mean paying more than $80 million in tax, which is higher than three teams’ projected luxury-tax payrolls for 2023, per Cots Contracts.
But that has not stopped Cohen from adding to the roster in pursuit of winning a championship.
“He doesn’t quiver,” manager Buck Showalter said. “He understands the responsibility to our fan base and the expectations that he’s trying to make everybody feel, including the fans. A lot of times that’s not good enough. He wants to be best in class at everything, whether it be a children’s Christmas party or the batting cage in St. Lucie. It’s all relevant. It’s something the players rally around.”
