Thursday catch-all thread (1/8/25)

Please use this thread all week to discuss any Mets-specific topic you wish.

Scott Boras’ mouthpiece Jon Heyman announces on Bleacher Report that Pete Alonso is looking for “at least a six-year deal.” Hey, you never know unless you ask. So far, no club - much less the Mets - has tripped over themselves to get this deal to Alonso ASAP.

It seems like it won’t be too much longer before Heyman declares that a “mystery team” has entered the bidding for Alonso. And if that doesn’t work, expect Heyman to talk about how the short-term deal with opt outs was a brilliant move by Boras, even though the Mets allegedly offered that deal weeks ago.

Several years ago, I had some interactions with Heyman. It was very nice that he was willing to engage and I give him credit for that. But that’s where my admiration stops. He apparently hasn’t advanced past looking at triple crown numbers and it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest that if he was running the Mets that they would have already signed Alonso to that six-year deal that all other teams have dismissed.

Of course, the beauty of this is that we’ll be able to know in a few years if signing Alonso to that type of deal was a good decision or not. It may take Alonso several contracts to get that - or it may not. Regardless, just remember where you stood on giving him a long-term deal and see if there are any lessons to be learned once you find out how he aged in real life.

In the past, I wanted the Mets to sign Adam Dunn to that type of deal when he was a free agent following the 2008 season. Dunn was coming off back-to-back 40-HR seasons and that type of power was right up my alley.

Unfortunately, Dunn’s 2008 - when he hit 40 HR and had 100 RBIs - only produced a 0.6 fWAR. Dunn played six more seasons after 2008 and produced a combined total of 4.0 fWAR for the remainder of his career.

It took me awhile to get there. Dunn was still of interest to me - even if not at the same level as before - when he became a free agent again after the 2010 season. But eventually it became obvious that as important as power is, there’s more to winning baseball than hitting home runs.

No different than being a good reporter requires more than carrying water for Boras.