Before his news conference on Wednesday to discuss an exciting season, New York Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns ran into pending free agent Pete Alonso at Citi Field.
“I told him I was about to answer a lot of questions about him. He told me, `Good luck,’” Stearns said with a smile.
“He’s a great Met. I hope we have him back. I think we both understand this is a process and everyone’s got their own interests, and Pete deserves to check out the free agent market to see what’s available and then make the best choice for him and his family.”
The slugger’s future is one of the key topics as the Mets head into an offseason filled with important decisions after a surprising playoff run that ended Sunday with a Game 6 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League Championship Series.
“I think we probably ran out of gas a little bit. We had pushed our guys really hard from June 1 on because we needed to,” Stearns said.
“Every single game in the regular season mattered, and then clearly every single game in the postseason mattered. And that’s part of it. We also faced a really, really talented Dodgers team that was playing some of the best baseball possible.”
To beat the Dodgers next season, as well as Philadelphia and Atlanta in their own division, the Mets will need to improve their pitching staff.
Luis Severino (11-7, 3.91 ERA) and Jose Quintana (10-10, 3.75) are set to become free agents. Sean Manaea (12-6, 3.47) is also expected to decline a $13.5 million player option for 2025 and join them in free agency.
Those three veterans made a total of 94 regular-season starts and 10 more in the playoffs as New York finished just two wins away from the World Series.
“This isn’t new to us. We faced a similar task last offseason. We’re going to have to replace innings,” Stearns said. “Certainly part of that could potentially be from some of those guys returning, or we may look elsewhere.
But we’re going to have to add starting pitching. We’re going to have to add multiple starters. We understand that. We went into last offseason with the same need, and I think we’ll be able to do it.”
Stearns has been particularly skilled at finding pitchers, not just this year with the Mets but also during his time managing the small-market Milwaukee Brewers.
He brought in Severino and Manaea last winter on short-term deals, and both made significant contributions.
“There are no hard-and-fast rules for me,” Stearns said. “If we look at the history of long-term investments with pitchers, it is not overwhelmingly a rosy picture.
But there are pitchers who have gone into their mid- or late-30s and pitched very well. And so if we think we can identify that, then there could be exceptions.”
Corbin Burnes, Max Fried, and Blake Snell are top starting pitchers available in free agency. Burnes, who turned 30 on Tuesday, was drafted and developed by the Brewers while Stearns was in charge. The right-hander won the 2021 NL Cy Young Award with Milwaukee before being traded to Baltimore last winter.
“I think it’s too early to determine exactly where we’re going to take our shots,” Stearns said. “I would expect us to be active in free agency.”
Once contract options are settled next month, New York will likely have more than $100 million available from a major league-high 2024 payroll of $332 million under owner Steve Cohen.
“We’ve got financial flexibility. It means that pretty much the entirety of the player universe is potentially accessible to us. That’s an enormous opportunity. I envision us taking advantage of that opportunity and being aggressive in certain areas,” Stearns said.
“We’re also not going to do anything that hinders us in future years and prevents us from continually adding and supporting our core group.”
Alonso earned a $20.5 million salary this season and batted .240 with 34 home runs, 88 RBIs, and a .788 OPS while playing in all 162 regular-season games.
Those numbers at the plate were lower than in previous years, but the fan-favorite first baseman performed well in the postseason and hit several crucial home runs. He also drew 12 walks in 13 games.
“We have great memories from this run,” Stearns said. “It’s also time for us to begin to move forward and see what we can do to build on this to ensure we have the type of sustainable competitiveness — true sustainable competitiveness — that’s eluded this organization for a long time.”
Alonso turns 30 in December and is represented by well-known agent Scott Boras.
“Who Pete is as a person is important. What he means to this franchise is important. Who he is as a player is also important and what he contributes on the field. There’s no magic formula to this,” Stearns said.
“Pete and I frankly have never really talked about his contract face-to-face. I think those conversations are best left generally with a player’s representative. But Pete and I talked about the team plenty. He’s very invested in our group. He certainly was very invested in this team this year and got some huge hits for us down the stretch.”
