Where will Juan Soto land as a free agent next year?
He said he’s going to give all 30 teams equal chance to court him, although we all know in reality only a handful of teams have the cash he’s going to command – and our resident curmudgeon, Joe Benigno, thinks it’s going to New York…but not his borough?
“I think he'll be playing in New York one way or the other, and I still think he's probably gonna stay with the Yankees,” Joe told Evan & Tiki Friday. “Although, you heard him say he’s open to every time, and I’m sure Boras is teaching him that way.”
And with that agent, Joe has one caveat for his Yankees prediction:
“The one thing we have to see is that Uncle Stevie cannot be outbid for him,” Joe said. “You gotta give me the biggest bid for Soto, and we’ll see what happens.”
“I think Yankees fans feel the same way about Hal Steinbrenner, they should not be outbid, but as a Mets fan, this is why Steve Cohen is here: to get the generational baseball player who's 25 years old in the prime of his career,” Evan agreed. “It doesn't matter that he's a Yankee, he could have been a Dodger or still a National – this is the guy you open up the checkbook for, and I’d admit I'd be very disappointed if the Mets are not the highest bidder.”
Whether or not someone matches that bid and he chooses between multiple teams at the same price remains to be seen even within that.
Soto will get the qualifying offer and decline it, and no team will care, so it won’t be a situation where he sits unsigned until late in the offseason.
But, given it’s Scott Boras, and given what it’ll take to sign him, how long will the Soto Sweepstakes last?
“It feels like there's a lot more billionaires as owners right now and the money seems different than it has in a really long time, and I wonder how long this takes,” Tiki said. “There have been some seasons lately where no one is signing free agents.”
“It's gonna be a while,” Joe replied. “The only way it gets done fast is if the Yankees sign him, and I don't know what that number would be.”
The Yankees do have the exclusive window until early next week to re-sign Soto, but even if they don’t, Evan doesn’t think this goes beyond the Winter Meetings.
“Free agency is gonna begin in a few days, but I'll tell you this, and I hope I'm right: I think he's signing by early December, because I don't think he needs to wait,” Evan said. “He's the king of free agency, and can sit there and say, let’s hear your best offers,’ and then he makes a decision.”
Joe & Evan, at least, would be fine with Soto even if it means Pete Alonso leaves, so there’s that, too.