NEW YORK — When the Mets originally offered Pete Alonso a contract extension, Steve Cohen was the owner but a different executive was running the front office. Then-general manager Billy Eppler hoped to lock up Alonso to a long-term deal reported to be $158 million over seven years.
The terms weren't extraordinary, yet Alonso rejected them.
Just two years later, and three months into free agency, the Mets convinced Alonso to settle for a two-year, $54 million contract — or, about $100 million less in guaranteed money.
A long-term offer was no longer on the table for Alonso because Mets second-year president of baseball operations David Stearns wouldn't present it to him. Sure, the Polar Bear had a down year in 2024, which made for an underwhelming market in free agency. But he hadn't dramatically changed as a player. He still hit 34 home runs in the regular season, followed by a .999 OPS in the postseason, including the most memorable home run of his career.
What did change was Alonso's age. He turned 30 in December, a number that wasn't lost on the Mets' current front office given its historical correlation to a player's decline.
The Mets always wanted Alonso back, but Stearns wasn't going to throw around Cohen's money and flex that financial might just because he could. The deal had to make sense for them now and later. Alonso can take solace in being the highest-paid first baseman in MLB this year, earning a reported $30 million with an opt-out after the season, while the Mets got him to agree to the shorter-term deal they now desired.
"If he performs well, good for him, right? I mean, how fantastic is that," Cohen told FOX Sports in a phone call on Thursday. "He just has to be Pete. Go do his thing. Hopefully
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