There is one reason and one reason only for the Mets — and that has come to mean their owner, Steve Cohen the way that the Yankees for so long had meant George Steinbrenner — not to engage in serious contract extension negotiations with Pete Alonso this offseason.
And that would be if Cohen and the executive support staff in the front office believe the first baseman, who will turn 29 on Dec. 4, will age poorly through a long-term extension.
That’s it.
The idea the Mets would put themselves in better position for the future by trading Alonso, who is eligible to become a free agent following the 2024 season, for a package of prospects is folly.
Well, folly unless the Mets are, uh, repurposing the clock for contention to 2026 or 2027, which surely would be news to the paying customers.
The Mets will have a Swiss cheese lineup entering the winter. There is a hole at third base. Brett Baty? There is a hole in left field. Who? There is a hole in right field. Starling Marte? They will need a bounce-back from Jeff McNeil. They will have to hope that catcher Francisco Alvarez can build off this rookie season even as he has worn down this summer. The rotation and bullpen are needy.
And you’re telling me that they would create another hole for themselves — a crater, actually — by moving Alonso, not only the face of the franchise but whom the manager can reliably and comfortably pencil into the lineup in the cleanup spot day after day after day?
“The guy’s going to drive in 100 runs again, going to hit 40 home runs again,” manager Buck Showalter said before the Mets rallied for Wednesday’s 10-inning, 6-5 victory over Texas at Citi Field. “I mean, he’s going to post up every day.
“We’re lucky to have him. We’re lucky to have him.”
Alonso has 39 homers and 96 RBIs, mired in a slump in which he has gone 3-for-25 with one RBI over his past eight games. He went 1-for-3 in this one in which he was intentionally walked to load the bases both in the fifth and 10th. He also initiated a sweet 3-2-4 double play to end the top of the 10th after the Rangers had loaded the bases. His homer-less drought, though, reached nine games.
Maybe, just maybe, Alonso has suffered from all the noise that has surrounded him over the past month. There was uncertainty about his future at the deadline, with reports following that the Mets had engaged in serious trade talk with Milwaukee. There was the teardown of a purported win-now team. There has been much recent chatter about the contract that will not dissipate until there is a resolution.
Some fool on radio who has never stepped foot into the clubhouse decided to cite Alonso as being the cause of a “toxic” clubhouse. That made its way into public discourse for a time.
It seems as if there has always been something circling around Alonso, who just goes out and plays. Well, maybe he throws the F-word around too liberally for some sensitive ears. I just don’t get it.
“He’s handled a lot of things that would affect normal people,” Showalter said. “There’s probably like 10 things that nobody is really aware of that has happened off the field and he’s handled it.
“I’ve been amazed at how tough he is mentally and emotionally through as many swings as there are at this level. You know, you’re great one day and the next day you’re not. But I’m not going to say that some of that stuff … you know, I talk to him every day and today he seemed to be in a really good frame of mind.”
I am not going to pretend that I can project Alonso’s career arc through his mid-30s, which is where a contract extension will take him. But there haven’t been any red flags from year-to-year. No alarm bells.
Alonso’s batting average is down, .219 after entering the season at a career .261, but some of that can be attributed to the first baseman rushing back from a wrist injury in July then suffering the consequences the next three weeks. The power numbers are consistent. His barrel percentage and exit velocity are at their highest since his 2019 rookie season. His fly ball percentage is the highest of his career. His chase percentage is his lowest ever.
Now, this does not mean that the Mets should offer Alonso a blank check or are obligated to come close to Aaron Judge’s nine-year, $360 million extension forged last winter. If that’s what Alonso is looking for, then it will be him leaving the Mets, not the Mets leaving him.
Judge and Shohei Ohtani are the faces of baseball. Alonso is not that.
But this is what Alonso is, again as defined by Showalter: “He’s a pleaser. He wants to please the people who have expectations of him, and it’s a hard act to follow every year.”
It is imperative Cohen and the Mets do their utmost to ensure that Alonso remains a people pleaser in Queens for the foreseeable future. That means beyond 2024.