Mets and Francisco Lindor have come to a deal, according to multiple sources. From Andy Martino:

Sources: Francisco Lindor and Mets in agreement on deal that is approximatlely 10 years, $340 million as @JonHeyman
reported. There is a limited no trade and no opt outs per source

27 comments on “Wednesday catch-all thread (3/31/21)

  • Brian Joura

    Glad they were able to get this done and I hope it works out for everyone. And I’m glad there are no opt outs.

  • Metsense

    This a good deal is for all parties. Everyone leaves the table satisfied; the team, the player and the fans.
    LGM – Lindor Got Millions – Lets Go Mets !!!

    • JimO

      hahah – thats great….

  • ChrisF

    So the Mets get a seat at the big boys table which is what Cohen said he bought the team for. It’s a championship move. With 2021, Lindor is a Met for 11/363 – making clear this team belongs to Cohen and the fans, like said his intention was. Smart move. We’re looking at potentially the next 2 HoFers to wear a Mets cap playing at the same time. Chillingly great news.

    Well done Steve Cohen! And for reals, welcome to Queens Francisco Lindor! This town is yours!!!

  • TJ

    Ten year contracts are utterly insane…this actually being an 11 year commitment now with the 2021 deal in place. Lindor is coming off a subpar season by his standards. He is not a top 5 player in the sport by most objective rankings. The back end of this deal can be Cano-like. Yes, as a Met fan, these are the thoughts that go through my mind. But…from the franchise and branding point of view, the new ownership/management has now made a huge statement in a bold way…acquiring a high profile player with leverage to walk after one year. They paid top dollar to retain him. He is clearly a HOF caliber player, in his prime, with a lot of charisma. As Chris pointed out, they now have a seat at the big boy table. At this point, my only two hopes are that Mr. Lindor does not have any skeletons in the closet, and that I will be able to afford to go to another Met game at Citifield with my family (yes, that Met fandom is tough to get out of my system).

  • Footballhead

    Insane, stupid money…. Of course, that statement sounds like the dinosaur owners of the 1950s-1970s who warned that the reserve clause is what keeps the integrity of the game secure. Ha! The excellent 1991 book by Marvin Miller ” A Whole Different Ball Game”, is a must read for all those still stuck in the opening statement of mine.

    Stupid, greedy players? Stupid greedy owners? Stupid greedy agents? Stupid greedy fans?

    Welcome to the human race. So what. I’ll always be a Mets fan and a lover of this game and history of baseball. LGM!

  • JamesTOB

    I think TJ nailed it. My concern with contracts like this is the luxury tax, specifically the penalties that accrue when a team is consistently over it. Losing draft picks and losing money for international free agents make it very hard to build a farm system that consistently produces top talent. That Cohen has billions is irrelevant unless you think you can build a team from signing older free agents every year. One thing I don’t understand is the impact of deferred payments on the luxury tax threshold.

    Brian, could you explain?

    • Brian Joura

      We don’t have any idea what the MLB universe will look like with the new CBA. It’s possible that the thresholds and penalties will be completely different from what they are now. But, let’s assume they stay the same.

      In 2021, the Mets are paying Lindor $22.3 million and Marcus Stroman $18.9 million. After the season, Stroman leaves and you use the majority of his salary to pay for Lindor and apply the rest to someone else. And if they re-sign Stroman, then you sub in Syndergaard or Conforto and you still essentially have Lindor paid.

      Also, the Mets have yet to go over the luxury tax, so if they do in 2022 – they’ll pay the smallest fine. And they won’t incur draft pick penalties until they go $40 million over the cap, which is quite a bit away.

      As an invested fan – this is something to be aware of, not something about which to be concerned.

  • Name

    Well… what a way to welcome the 2021 season.
    All good points from everyone – my thoughts mostly lie with what TJ has already said.

    Is he really justified in getting the 3rd biggest contract of all time? No not even close. I would choose David Wright ages 21-26 over Lindor among many other players. Annual dollars justifiable, length surely not. But life is all about luck and timing and the worlds collided with a new owner with stupid money to spend and desperately wanting to make a splash.

    Having not watched him played, to me, his biggest strengths are defense and durability, both of which do not age well at all. It’s hard to imagine him being an asset that we wouldn’t want to upgrade past age 33 at most, which leaves at least 4 years of him being an expensive cheerleader. To that I fear his path could follow Andruw Jones who was also super durable, and elite defender with an above average but not elite bat whose career just nosedived once he hit 30.

  • Boomboom

    Great deal. Had to get done. Conforto is next. 8 yrs 175-200 million. Syndergaard gets the QO and takes it after an uneven return. Stroman probably walks but you never know. Will be fun to see him pitching for his next contract.

  • ChrisF

    Opening Day Mets and Nats postponed because of Covid.

    Welcome back to reality.

    • Steve_S.

      So why do they have taxi squads and reserve sites?

      • Brian Joura

        “The reason for the alternate site being so close is exactly for this scenario playing out now,” Rizzo said on Wednesday. “We’re certainly prepared for it, no matter the numbers they throw at us.”

        Last year, Juan Soto tested positive on Opening Day. The Nationals played the season opener that night against the Yankees.

        https://www.mlb.com/mets/news/mets-nationals-opening-day-postponed

        Maybe the memory of playing without Soto is fresh in their mind…

  • Woodrow

    Wow Happy Day! Wonder if Angel fans were happy with Pujols signing, Tiger fans with Cabrera signing, Yanks with Stanton deal? And we all were happy with Wright signing. You never know…. That being said I am happy,at least for now.

    • Name

      Fans are always initially happy with FA signings. After all, it’s not their money and tunnel vision blocks out the disgusting thought of a late 30s player eating up 10% of the team’s payroll.
      They become unhappy and lament when they realize that the dead weight money is preventing the team from signing another new shiny FA.

  • Wobbit

    It makes sense to build your franchise around a great shortstop… add to that an above average switch-hitter with decent speed, and at least you get multi-dimensional talents added to your ball club. If he avoids injury and produces anywhere close to expectations, we are at least getting some reasonable return from being over a barrel.

    But I like the idea of a commitment to Lindor (until I watch him play regularly) more than Jose Reyes (less mature), and more than David Wright (less dimensional), and certainly more than Bobby Bonilla… I’m hoping he becomes the Mets’ Derek Jeter… ushering in a decade of winning baseball.

  • Paulc

    Why does any fan care how much Lindor — or any player — gets paid? Cohen is a $15 billion hedge fund guy who can afford it and is smart enough on how to spend his money. All that matters is putting the best players on the field; salary cap issues are largely a concern for owners, not fans. He’s the best all-around shortstop and has been a top 20 MLB player for several years. Good move by the new Mets owner.

    And the economics make sense. FanGraphs calculates that each win in a player’s bWAR is worth about $9 million. Excluding the shortened 2020, Lindor’s bWAR has averaged 5.9 from 2017-2019. That’s worth $54 million to Mets ownership. The wins are worth more from about 85 wins to 90 and much more for each win over 90 due to playoff revenue and the merchandise sales the playoffs generate.

    Bodes well for signing Thor and possibly Conforto.

    • Name

      How much players get paid do affect the fans. There’s a reason why going to games costs a fortune these days – it’s to pad the pockets of the players and owners. Players certainly wouldn’t be earning these types of money if ticket prices and merchandise were only rising at the rate of inflation.

      The fact that Cohen is uber rich means that he doesn’t need the Mets to be profitable and he can subsidize at times if he wants to, but make no mistake – the Mets as a business will turn a profit for him in the long run. Loss making businesses don’t sell for billions of dollars.
      And so when salaries expense increase they will make decisions to to increase revenue to cover – tickets prices will continue to rise, concessions will cost 2 arms and leg, and parking will be like a mortgage down payment.

    • TexasGusCC

      BS on the BS stat that each win is worth $9MM. Show me the contract that each win was worth $9MM. If you look at contracts, each win is about $6MM. Lindor has averaged about 5.6 fWAR these last four years, hence: 5.6 x 6 = 33.6 close enough.

      Name, it’s great to have you douse us with ice water again, LOL!

    • Brian Joura

      I’m pretty sure FanGraphs doesn’t calculate anything with bWAR

      • Paulc
        • Brian Joura

          The article you linked was not from FG. It did link to an article posted on FG but it was written by a guest contributor. His position should be viewed as his own, not as belonging to FG.

          You can see how FG values a win by going to the “Value” section of a player’s page. Take someone who has been in the majors for awhile. I used Robinson Cano. Last year, Cano had a fWAR of 1.3 and FG assigned that a value of $10.6 million, meaning they valued a win for Cano at $8.15 million. If you do this for every year of his career, you see they’ve never valued a win at $9 million, despite what that guest contribution from 2017 said.

          • Paulc

            Thanks, Brian. I’m on B-R everyday, but rarely FG. Player value has always fascinated me and it looks like, per FG, Cohen paid fair market for Lindor as FG rates a win as being worth about $8 million. Using FG’s Value page, Lindor’s 2017-19 seasons were worth about $48 MM per year. Admittedly tough to place dollar value on a win, but it explains why owners are signing players to $30 MM AAV contracts. It makes sense economically if it gets the team into the playoffs.

  • Wobbit

    What I think ultimately hurst the teams and the sport in general are the really long-term contracts. Imagine if contracts could never exceed five years. Teams would be paying for much closer to what they are actually getting than for subsidizing a player’s declining years.

    After five very lucrative years, a given player would renegotiate his value and be rewarded with another contract, much closer to his actual worth. Yeah, I understand it would equate to less money in his later career, but I’m not going to cry for a very rich man getting only what’s appropriate.

    I’m not a fan of teams having to overpay players with ten-year contracts… it’s a form of greed that ultimately hurts the average player.

    • Name

      There is no right or good solution to this problem.

      The reason players are overpaid in their latter years is because the system forces them to play for “pennies” in their early career. Imagine if young players reached Free Agency after just 1 or 2 full years in the majors. Then, players would be able to to sign 10 year deals and actually be productive assets for all of them.
      But then how would small market teams like the Rays compete if they lose all their good young players after 1-2 years?
      It’s also the teams consciously making deals that are back loaded. The Pujols deal with the Angels had them paying $12m during his first year and $30 mil in his last year. The deal is clearly not set up to match the current year’s salary to expected production. Teams could just as easily just start making front loaded deals where players are paid a boatload in their 20s and less as they age but GMs choose not to as no one is bold enough to break the status quo.
      Also if you limit length of deals all you’ll end up doing is moving to the basketball system where players want an opt out every year and just re-up for the max every offsesason. You’ll still end up with overpaid players at some point.

  • Wobbit

    Even if a player is limited to 5 years at a time, they still make enough money to be mega-rich. I mean, whether you have 100 million or 400 million, you’re still set for life with more than you can ever spend, and so are your children and grandchildren.

    Sooner or later, the ceiling will lower and players will learn to live with a lesser amount, and the game will be better for it.

    • Name

      Sure of course ballplayers (along with other professions) are making more than they’ll ever need but i didn’t think that’s what the discussion was about.

      “Teams would be paying for much closer to what they are actually getting than for subsidizing a player’s declining years.”

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