In an offseason dominated by Shohei Ohtani’s free agency, Juan Soto was in the news cycle plenty.
It feels like a warm-up for next winter, when Soto’s own free agency is expected to take center stage.
Of course, the Yankees can try to keep Soto from hitting the open market, but it will likely take a Godfather offer to have any chance of happening. Soto set the record straight on Tuesday in his introductory Zoom call, in which, not surprisingly, he was peppered with questions about a possible extension and his future in The Bronx.
“About any contract stuff, they know where to call and who to talk to,” Soto said, referring to his superagent, Scott Boras.
You can bet Boras and Soto had a keen eye on the 10-year, $700 million contract — albeit one with significant deferrals that lowered the present-day value — that Ohtani ultimately signed with the Dodgers. Soto does not also pitch, as Ohtani does, but he is a generational talent and he is set to enter the market at the age of 26, which does not happen very often.
All of that means the number Soto’s camp may start with is $437.8 million, which is how the Players Association is valuing Ohtani’s contract because of the deferrals ($68 million out of every $70 million each year), per The Post’s Jon Heyman.
Soto turned down a $440 million extension offer from the Nationals in 2022 before the team traded him to the Padres, though that offer was spread over 15 years for an average annual value of “only” $29.3 million.
Now, the average annual value for Soto’s eventual deal is likely to exceed $40 million — the AAV of his new teammate, Aaron Judge — and it’s not hard to envision a deal that surpasses $500 million total.
Given some of the hefty contracts the Yankees are already tied up in — and possibly one more to come if they are able to land Yoshinobu Yamamoto — is adding another something they will have the appetite for? They will probably have a year to chew on that one.
In the meantime, it’s important to put Soto’s pending free agency into context.
To start, here are the top 10 biggest contracts of all time, a list the superstar outfielder is likely to soon join:
You’ll notice that six of the top 10 deals were done as extensions rather than the player hitting the open market. Two of those free-agent deals — Harper and Seager — were negotiated by Boras.
Besides being one of the best hitters in today’s game, the biggest thing Soto has going for him is that he is on track to enter free agency at the age of 26. He debuted at the age of 19 and just turned 25 in October, a point Boras hammered home during his annual address at last week’s winter meetings.
“You gotta remember, Soto right now would be like Judge in his rookie year, age-wise,” Boras said, referencing Judge turning 25 in April of his Rookie of the Year campaign in 2017. “So he would be beginning his career. Then you think about what Soto’s done prior to this time, it tells you what a remarkable talent he is by his age. You’re talking about Soto being younger than [Orioles star catcher] Adley Rutschman.
“[Rutschman] is a great young player, but [Soto] is younger than him and he’s been in the league for five, six years. It’s been remarkable. World champion, numbers beyond belief. He’s really in the top category of three or four players in the game’s history to do what he’s done at his age.”
Sounds like the sales pitch that Boras will be making to teams next offseason.
But he has a point. It’s not often that clubs can get their hands on a player of Soto’s caliber at his age.
Here’s a look at the biggest contracts signed by players aged 26 and under, the majority of which have come in extensions while a player was already under contract.
When you narrow down these lists to the exact scenario Soto is likely to be facing — a free agent by the age of 26 — it becomes much more exclusive:
Teams want to pay free agents for their future performance, not what they have done in the past. But it’s worth noting that, among players through their age-24 season, Soto ranks 21st all-time with an fWAR of 28.4 — higher than Harper (26.3) and Machado (23.1).
The only recent players above Soto in that category were Trout (47.2), Rodriguez (35.0), Ken Griffey Jr. (35.0), Andruw Jones (30.3) and Albert Pujols (30.0). Of that group, only Rodriguez entered free agency before he was 30.
The $252 million deal Boras got Rodriguez with the Rangers in 2000 — at the time the biggest contract in any North American team sport, by far — has since been bumped down to the 18th-largest all-time in MLB. But adjusting for inflation, using the U.S. Bureau of Labor’s CPI calculator, it would now be worth about $443.5 million.
That would be an AAV of $44.35 million, which could be around what Soto is headed for, especially if he has a big walk year as a Yankee.
Covering our bases
With all the Soto madness dominating the winter meetings from a Yankees perspective, a few things may have slipped through the cracks from media availabilities with Aaron Boone and Brian Cashman.
Here’s a quick rundown:
• Nestor Cortes ended the season on the IL due to a rotator cuff strain (a recurrence of the injury he was initially diagnosed with in June), but was continuing his throwing program to build up to a high-intensity bullpen session to make sure his shoulder was fully healthy. That came to fruition in early November before Cortes was shut down.
Then, after the left-hander got married and went on his honeymoon, he began another throwing program last Monday (Dec. 4) to start the buildup for spring training.
“So he’s doing well,” Boone said.
• Anthony Rizzo also ended the year on the IL because of post-concussion syndrome that hindered his performance before he was ultimately shut down in August. But Boone said Rizzo was “doing great.”
“He was in New York pretty much all of October and even into November, coming into the stadium and working out,” Boone said. “I would say by the end of the season, he was probably game-ready and ready to go. He’s in really good shape, and, yeah, I expect him to be able to have a normal winter — or he’s in the middle of a normal winter of training and getting ready, and I know he is really excited.
Boone said he was not sure whether Rizzo still needed to see doctors for the checkups he was getting at the end of the season.
“I just know he is cleared and ready to roll,” Boone said. “Now it’s about going out and proving it to himself.
• At some point after the Yankees had interviewed a number of candidates to be their next bench coach, Boone told Cashman they had their guy in Brad Ausmus.
“I said, ‘Well, you’re Batman, you need to find your Robin,’” Cashman said. “We lost a good one in [Carlos Mendoza] and we believe we got a good one in Brad. … I’m certainly happy that we found someone the caliber of Brad to try to replace what we lost in Mendy.”
Spring showdown
There will be a new twist to spring training in 2024: As part of MLB’s “Spring Breakout,” a team made up of the Yankees’ top prospects will square off against the Blue Jays’ best prospects.
That game will be part of a doubleheader — after the Yankees and Blue Jays square off in a big league spring training game — on March 16 at George M. Steinbrenner Field.
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