The Mets finally landed the big fish they've been angling for in free agency, as Juan Soto has agreed to sign a record-breaking contract that will keep him in Queens until 2039. Soto's deal will pay him $765 million over the next 15 seasons, besting the total value of Shohei Ohtani's contract from a year ago by $65 million.
It's a blockbuster deal for MLB, the largest guaranteed contract in professional sports history, and a franchise-altering move for the Mets, who have been linked to just about every marquee free agent since Steve Cohen acquired the team. But does it really matter where Juan Soto is playing when considering his Fantasy value?
To a certain extent, of course it does! Soto would be an impact hitter anywhere he called home. But we already saw him take a bit of a step back when he played at Petco Park, where he has a career .807 OPS. We also saw a career-best season from him in the much more hitter-friendly confines of Yankee Stadium last season.
Even for future Hall of Famers, home ballparks and lineup context matter.
They just tend to only matter on the edges of the profile, and that does figure to be the case for Soto. Citi Field isn't a great place to hit, ranking 27th out of 30 MLB ballparks in BaseballSavant.com's Park Factor stats. It tends to play pretty neutral for power for left-handed hitters, but that's still a big step back from Yankee Stadium, which has had the second-best park factor for left-handed hitters over the past three seasons. That might make a repeat of his 41 homers from 2024 somewhat unlikely.
But even that isn't a guarantee. After all, Soto actually underperformed his underlying stats in 2024, which is a pretty bonkers thing to say about a guy who finished third in the majors in wOBA behind only Aaron Judge and Ohtani's historic seasons, but it's the truth. Soto's .463 xwOBA was behind only Judge, as he underperformed both his expected batting average (.316 vs. .288) and expected ISO (.330 vs. .281).
Will Soto be among the elite in Fantasy with the Mets?
The fact that Soto underperformed in the best hitting environment of his life is probably worth keeping in mind. Soto has pretty consistently underperformed his expected stats for much of his career, thanks to a batted ball profile heavy on line drives and flyballs to the power alleys in left and center field, where the ball simply has to travel further to get out. That might just be a fact of life with Soto, and given that he also doesn't run much, it might be enough to keep him a tier below the truly elite options in Fantasy. The Mets ran more than the Yankees in 2024, so maybe you could see Soto getting closer to double-digits there, but probably not enough to ever be a true plus.
And yet … who cares? It's a minor park downgrade, probably a net-neutral lineup move, but it also just doesn't really matter very much for his Fantasy value. Soto was my No. 5 player in Roto (No. 2 in points) before he signed with the Mets, and I'm not particularly inspired to move him down.
The differences between players in that range of the rankings are slim enough that it certainly wouldn't take much to move him down -- especially if you really want to target steals with your first-round pick, which could fairly easily move Kyle Tucker and Elly De La Cruz ahead of him. Soto might have a limited path to being the No. 1 overall player, and if you want to argue that other guys with more stolen base upside should go ahead of him, I probably wouldn't argue too much. Anywhere between No. 5 and 10 overall made sense before this signing, and I don't think this really changes how you should view him.
There's still a lot of offseason left, and I can't imagine the Mets are done -- they've signed Frankie Montas and Clay Holmes as interesting experiments in the rotation, but it still feels like they are at least an arm away from having a real contender's rotation. They also have pretty glaring holes at first base and in the outfield, so I'd bet the Mets still have another $100 million or so in contracts coming. Cohen promised he'd spend money, and he's been true to that word, after all.
With the big picture on Soto settled, let's take a look at some other fallout from this deal:
Suddenly bullish on Vientos?
Soto is, obviously, a big addition that changes the outlook for the entire offense. He'll likely bat behind Francisco Lindor and in front of Mark Vientos, who now has a huge opportunity to become one of the league's elite run producers if the gains he made last season are real. We often talk about "lineup protection" as involving the guys behind a hitter, but it's better to think about it the opposite way. Soto's presence will create more opportunities for Vientos to hit with runners on base, which is typically an advantageous situation for hitters. If Soto has a direct impact on anyone in the lineup, it's likely to be for Vientos, assuming he hits behind him.
I have my concerns about Vientos' gains, myself. He still had pretty massive swing-and-miss issues, including a well-below average 75% in-zone contact rate, which combined with some aggressiveness on pitches out of the zone gives him a pretty scary floor. Like "he was so bad he got sent down to the minors on May 18th" kind of scary. But Soto should make his life easier, putting him in position for more hittable pitches, and Vientos showed last season he knows what to do with those. He could be a dark horse to lead the NL in RBI if he spends the whole season batting behind Lindor and Soto.
What now for the Yankees?
The Yankees came in second in the Soto sweepstakes, with their final offer reportedly coming in $5 million below the Mets', with an extra year added on top -- a $3.5 million difference in average salary. That comes out to a lot more once you account for luxury tax payments, but still, it's startling to see the Yankees lose out on an incumbent free agent to the Mets because they got outspent. What world are we living in?
One in which the Yankees suddenly find themselves shopping in the second tier of free agents. There are still some big names out there, but the Yankees really can't afford to get outbid from here on out. This lineup was incredibly top heavy last season, with Judge and Soto the only players to finish with an OPS+ north of 103 (100 is average) in over 459 plate appearances. Jazz Chisholm and Giancarlo Stanton both fell short of the PA part of that stat, and given their respect injury histories, neither is necessarily a good bet to get there in 2025.
Chisholm gives the Yankees flexibility in who they target, because he could conceivably play second base, third base, or the outfield. There's a hole in the lineup at first base, which could make them a player for Pete Alonso, who is well used to the New York spotlight. They could also go after Alex Bregman, an elite defensive third baseman who still has an above-average bat -- and would bring the contact skills the Yankees have clearly been targeting in recent years.
Christian Walker would be a nice alternative to Alonso, of course, though his age makes the risk of a quick, steep decline more real than you might think. He's already 34, and while he is an excellent defender at the cold corner, he's also only viable there. He would be a nice fit on a shorter deal, but would ideally be a complement to a Bregman signing.
They could also bring Gleyber Torres back, especially if he is willing to take a bigger, one-year deal to rebuild his value after a down season. Or, they could go in the opposite direction, and try to shore up the defense with someone like Ha-Seong Kim.
The point is, the Yankees have both the need and desire to spend, and we should expect at least a couple of signings now that they know Soto is off the table. Whether they'll be as aggressive as they need to be remains to be seen, but there are still multiple opportunities for this lineup to improve -- and it would certainly be a pretty great landing spot for any free agent, given the proximity to Judge in the lineup. Let's see what they do from here.
What does it mean for the rest of the market?
One nice thing about Soto coming to an agreement so quickly is that it means we won't have the biggest free agents sitting on the market until Spring Training like last year. Soto is off the board; so is Willy Adames, while Blake Snell also signed quickly after being one of the holdouts last season. Alonso and Bregman will likely face plenty of skepticism around their respective markets, but with the Yankees looming as the biggest loser of the offseason so far, they should be willing to be aggressive to keep themselves in the pennant conversation.
With Soto out of the picture right at the start of the Winter Meetings in Dallas, the focus can move to Bregman and Alonso, as well as Max Fried, Corbin Burnes, Jack Flaherty, and more. There are still plenty of difference makers available, and that's without even mentioning trade candidates like Garrett Crochet, Devin Williams, and Luis Robert -- who could be a viable candidate for the Yankee if they are willing to take on another injury-prone, star-when-he's-available player.
The biggest domino has fallen, and he left one of the biggest financial players on the market holding the bag. Hopefully that means we'll see the rest of the market move a bit more swiftly than in years past.
