Steve Cohen is Breaking All the Rules

Plus, how Carlos Correa has performed after ankle injuries

Good Morning,

We are two days away from Christmas and it feels like we are in the middle of the season with all the roster moves and headlines related to the Mets.

Yesterday was a bit quieter than earlier in the week, but we still had some action.

Joey Lucchesi avoided an arbitration hearing by signing a one-year, $1.15 million deal. The Mets released Yoan López, who will pitch next year in Japan, creating the requisite room on the 40-man roster to add recently signed utility man Danny Mendick. Oh, and that new Carlos Correa guy had his physical with the Mets.

We have a jam-packed newsletter today. I will talk about Correa’s ankle and how his performance has been impacted by ankle injuries in the past. I will discuss whether Steve Cohen is spending to fill an organizational gap or simply changing the rules. And I will touch on the future of some of the near-term prospects in light of the Correa signing.

With the holidays upon us, it’s a great time to give a gift subscription to Mets Fix. It’s also a wonderful time to treat yourself to a subscription!

Before we get into the topics I outlined above, let’s catch you up on the latest news.

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🍎 EXCITED: Carlos Correa is “eager” to play third base, alongside Francisco Lindor. “He feels he can get a little bit stronger and seize that position,” his agent Scott Boras said, via Anthony DiComo.

⚾️ MORE ON CORREA: In a sweeping account of the events leading to Correa becoming a Met, Jeff Passan of ESPN notes Steve Cohen’s wife, Alex, advocated for him to sign Correa. It might have been reported elsewhere, but Passan also confirms Correa has a full no-trade clause.

🏟️ HOT TICKET: Mets fans are excited. The team reportedly sold 1 million single-game tickets in the aftermath of the Correa signing on Wednesday.

😡 JEALOUS: Meanwhile, several owners aren’t happy with the way Steve Cohen is spending.

“I think it’s going to have consequences for him down the road,” an official with another major league team told Evan Drellich of The Athletic. “There’s no collusion. But … there was a reason nobody for years ever went past $300 million. You still have partners, and there’s a system.”

“Our sport feels broken now,” a different rival executive was quoted as saying in the piece. “We’ve got somebody with three times the median payroll and has no care whatsoever for the long-term of any of these contracts, in terms of the risk associated with any of them. How exactly does this work? I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around it.”

💰 CONTRACT DETAILS: Kodai Senga’s five-year, $75 million deal will pay him $14 million annually from 2023 to 2027, with a $5 million signing bonus. He has a $15 million conditional club option for 2028 if he has Tommy John Surgery or a right elbow injury causes him to be placed on the IL for more than 130 consecutive days. He also has an opt out after the 2025 season if he pitches at least 400 innings over the next three seasons. He also has several performance incentives.

💔 RIP: The Mets announced the passing of Jett “Macho” Diaz, who spent a day as a Met as part of the Make-A-Wish Foundation last season.

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We might never know the real reason why the Giants blinked at the last second before introducing Carlos Correa as their new star shortstop.

We know as a 19-year-old prospect Correa injured his leg on a slide into third base. He would later undergo surgery for a fractured right fibula and ligament. This is reportedly the injury that halted his agreement with the Giants and spurred a midnight deal with the Mets.

If we are to believe it came down to an ankle injury from 2014, I thought it would be interesting to at least look at how his ankle might have impacted his performance through the years.

Luckily, we have a good start. In 2016, Eno Sarris noticed a dip in Correa’s batted ball performance and found it coincided with him rolling his ankle, an injury that otherwise would have been easily unnoticed since he never went on the IL.

When asked about this at the time, Correa provided a cryptic response:

“Some of those things people don’t know,” Correa said, via FanGraphs. “Some parts of the body are hurting so you have to lay off some things and deal with some things. It’s something that people don’t know, but obviously you know.”

Building from this, I searched for a more recent example and found September 2020 when he suffered a bone bruise after fouling a ball off his left ankle. He ended up playing the next night, going 0-for-3 with a strikeout. And sure enough, his performance continued to suffer, as it did in 2016. After starting the month with a .292/.370/.417 slash line, he finished the last two weeks of the season following his ankle injury with a meager .216 batting average and only two extra base hits.

🔻 What does this mean? Honestly, not a whole lot. Players get injured. They sometimes play through those injuries. Carlos Correa decided to play through a few ankle injuries, his performance temporarily suffered, but what do you expect? The key point is neither ankle injury led to long-term ramifications.

I want to talk about how the Mets’ spending spree, including the Correa signing, impacts some of the Mets’ prospects, but before I do that, I think it’s time we recognize that Steve Cohen is breaking all the rules. Duh! As one of the richest owners in sports continues to spend, there has been a narrative building that he is doing so to cover an organizational gap in talent. In other words, he’s not just throwing money around without reason. He has a grand plan to eventually spend less, as long as he has enough homegrown talent to fill out the roster.

🙋 I will raise my hand to admit I have made this argument. The logic is that by spending now, you can continue to contend while your farm system catches up in producing major-league-ready players. At that point, you can offset the expensive back-end of long-term contracts, like Nimmo’s and Correa’s, with cheap, team-controlled talent.

It makes sense if we continue to think in the traditional sense. But think about the Mets roster for a second. In a perfect world, several of their young farm players will become legitimate contributors or hopefully All-Stars in 3-5 years. Is that not what we already have right now?

In other words, a big part of the team’s core is already homegrown. There’s Pete Alonso, Brandon Nimmo and Jeff McNeil. Nimmo was paid already. The current homegrown discount comes with the arbitration-eligible players; the Amazins will only pay McNeil a projected $6 million in 2023 and Alonso another $15.9 million.

⏩ Fast forward to 2025. That magical year in the future when the next crop of prospects should be ready to contribute. Guess what?! Both McNeil and Alonso are free agents. They are going to require massive long-term deals to keep them, just like Nimmo. And if Francisco Álvarez proves worthy of his prospect ranking, he will simply replace Alonso as a team-controlled player making the equivalent of an expensive one-year deal in free agency.

The savings are more obvious in the rotation. For all of the money thrown around over the past month, Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander remain tops for AAV at $43 million each. New York gave another $75 million over five years to Kodai Senga. They owe $26 million over two years to José Quintana. Carlos Carrasco has become a trade candidate with $14 million remaining on his deal.

Substitute a few of those rotation pieces with homegrown arms and the payroll would look less bloated. But again, do you really think Steve Cohen is going to pass up the chance of signing a pitcher like Justin Verlander because he has a young, #3 starter in Matt Allan ready to pitch? No, he might skip the Quintana signing, which doesn’t change the bottom line that much.

🔻 BOTTOM LINE: If the Mets want to be perennial contenders, they need to develop homegrown talent. Without Alonso, McNeil and Nimmo, they aren’t a 100-win team. Developing more young pitching is particularly important. But don’t fool yourself into thinking Steve Cohen is going to suddenly stop spending on the very best players on the market. Homegrown talent provides savings on the margins. For most teams, it gives them an excuse not to spend into the luxury tax. Cohen doesn’t operate like other teams.

🚜 Given the big picture context, let’s discuss how the Correa signing impacts the group of prospects who are closest to the major leagues. Francisco Álvarez has a clear path on this team, so we will leave him aside.

But with Francisco Lindor and Carlos Correa locked up for the next decade, there won’t be much opportunity at shortstop or the hot corner anytime soon.

What does this mean for Brett Baty, Ronny Mauricio and Mark Vientos?

🔷 Let’s start with Baty. I’ve seen people suggest the Mets can just pivot him to left field, where he has already played 29 games in the minors. This doesn’t make sense to me.

Why sacrifice his value as a third-base prospect to fill a corner outfield position? Just look at the current market. After billions of dollars have been spent and the free agent class nearly picked to the bone, there are still corner outfielders available. They are a dime a dozen. You can find them for the same cost you would pay an effective young player in the later years of arbitration.

The Mets would be wise to continue to develop Baty at third base as to maximize his value in trade. He is worth more to them as currency to acquire pitching than he is as a versatile young player destined for a corner outfield position.

Ronny Mauricio gives them more flexibility as a middle infielder. Perhaps he becomes the second baseman of the future. As I noted above, Jeff McNeil will be a free agent in 2025. However, if Mauricio doesn’t make the transition, similar to Baty, I would keep developing him at his natural position, a position of scarcity, and eventually reap the benefits in trade.

Ironically, Mark Vientos might be the safest near-term prospect after the dust settles. He’s not on the level of the other three guys, but his raw power is off the charts. He’s really a first baseman/DH more than a third baseman. The organization can find him at-bats. Injuries always happen. As Álvarez eventually takes on more catching duties, who knows if Vientos ends up becoming the right-handed DH option down the road.

🔻 BOTTOM LINE: The Mets don’t have to do anything today. I will write next week about the temptation of adding Liam Hendriks, but that’s not a necessity at this point. The best path is to keep developing their young talent in the positions where they provide the most value. Don’t do anything silly like move Baty to left field. He provides more value as a third-base trade chip for pitching than he does as a corner outfielder in the future.

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◾️ An arbitrator reduced Trevor Bauer’s 324-game suspension to 194-games, reinstating him, effective immediately. The Dodgers have 14 days to determine whether to release him or add him to their 40-man roster.

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🔗 Inside the unprecedented turn of events that made Carlos Correa a New York Met, by Jeff Passan, ESPN ($): “On Sunday night, Carlos Correa, his wife, son, parents, siblings and in-laws would descend on San Francisco and check in to their rooms on the 12th floor of the St. Regis hotel. On Monday, Correa would undergo a physical examination by the San Francisco Giants, the final step to make official the $350 million deal they'd agreed to six days earlier. On Tuesday, the entire family would attend Correa's introductory news conference, followed by a cable-car tour of the city and media blitzkrieg. It was perfect, a three-day introduction for a contract set to last 13 years. And then it all fell apart.”

🔗 How Steve Cohen is changing the way MLB owners spend, by Buster Olney, ESPN ($): “With the addition of Correa on a 12-year, $315 million deal, Cohen has bought a roster of baseball Lamborghinis. Each member of the Mets' projected infield has at least two All-Star appearances. The No. 1 and No. 2 starting pitchers should be unanimous selections for the Hall of Fame. The Mets' closer struck out half of the hitters he faced last season, before getting the biggest contract ever for a reliever. The Mets fans who suffered through the years when the Wilpon family sometimes conducted business as if it were running a small-market team are rejoicing at the big-spending tendencies of the owner referred to on social media as Uncle Steve.”

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