PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — Days before he debuted in the major leagues at 19 years old, Juan Soto was in Woodbridge, Virginia, playing in a lower level of the minor leagues, 31 miles and a world away from Nationals Park.
He had been suiting up for the Potomac Nationals, and his teammates and coaches were amazed at this polite Dominican kid rocketing through the farm system. Nobody realized just how close he was to The Show, but he was plenty friendly, spoke good English and hit baseballs so far and so hard that it triggered existential crises in those who ostensibly were his peers, causing them to wonder if they were even playing the right sport — or the same sport.
Late at night after a game, Soto and a handful of others sat at their lockers. A pitcher who went on to appear in four games in the majors couldn’t help but ask: "Juan, is baseball easy?''
“No, baseball is hard,” Soto replied.
Those within earshot stopped to look at each other, confused that this guy who made it look easy thought it not to be. They waited a beat. Soto continued.
“Hitting is easy,” he said. “The rest of it is hard.”
Ah. Jakson Reetz, who was a catcher for that 2018 Potomac club and who joined the Mets on a minor-league contract in the offseason, laughed as he told the story recently. Soto, 26 now, seemed almost embarrassed.
“Ugh,” he said in a sitdown interview with Newsday. “I do remember saying stuff like that.”
But that was Soto, Reetz said. He was and is so good and so young — and now, primarily because of those two qualities, so rich. Soto in December joined the Mets on the largest contract in sports history, $765 million across 15 years, a landmark signing not just for the organization but for baseball.
On the eve of his first season in Queens, consider this a snapshot of who Soto is — the superstar, the person, the present and future face of the franchise.
‘The best is coming’
The list of those who have been this productive for this long at this young age is a who’s-who of some of the best baseball has ever seen: Mickey Mantle and Mike Trout, Mel Ott and Alex Rodriguez.
And here is the best part, in the view of Mets officials who explained why they were comfortable offering such a long and lucrative contract: Soto should be just entering his prime.
Juan Soto's career stats
Games: 936
Average: .285
Home runs: 201
Runs scored: 655
RBIs: 592
On-base percentage: .421
Slugging percentage: .532
Stolen bases: 57
Walks: 769
“They’re right. The best is coming,” Soto said. “I’m in the middle of my prime. I think that’s one of the things I told them, too. The best is coming. We have a long way to go, but I feel like the best Juan Soto has to come in the next couple of years, so I want to be at a place where we can have a really good group surrounding me and try to get the best out of it.”
Already, Soto has compiled four All-Star nods, five Silver Slugger awards, a batting title, a World Series championship and a second Fall Classic appearance.
What is peak Soto, then?
“I can’t even imagine,” he said. “I’m going to try to be the best the next couple of years before I start aging.”
Mets owner Steve Cohen described Soto as “so singularly focused on baseball.” To Reetz, he was always “just different.” Phillies hitting coach Kevin Long, who while in that role with Washington became Soto’s all-time favorite coach, called him “obviously as talented a hitter as I’ve ever coached” — a list that includes Rodriguez, Derek Jeter, David Wright, Yoenis Cespedes and Bryce Harper (on two clubs).
“It was kind of cool to watch a young kid have so much confidence and understanding of what he was doing and the art of hitting,” Long said of a still-teenaged Soto. “Superstar waiting to happen.”
‘Kind, caring soul’
In the quiet middle innings of a Subway Series game that was not close, a loud man in the stands down the rightfield line at Citi Field stood up. He had an idea. He needed to voice it.
“Soto!” he said, calling to the Yankees’ rightfielder last summer. “Come to the Mets! Come to the Mets!”
In center, a few other fans sought to express a similar sentiment, waving Soto over — beckoning — when he happened to turn and glance at them. They wanted him to come not to their section, but their borough. Some sung to him in Spanish. Others chanted “We want Soto!” as he jogged off the field.
Soto heard it, he acknowledged later. He wasn’t a free agent yet, but the recruiting process was on — just not in his mind.
“I’m loyal. I was a Yankee,” Soto said. “Whatever those comments, I don’t give a [expletive]. I’m part of the team I have on my chest. Yeah, they were trying to be nice, come here, come over, this and that. I’m like, no, I’m part of this team I have on my chest.”
Soto tapped the logo on his chest, indicating the Yankees. But the actual logo on his chest at that moment was the orange interlocking NY. After a crosstown free-agency showdown, the Mets got their man — and they appreciate him as a man.
To those who know or have recently gotten to know Soto, that pledge of loyalty is indicative of the type of person he is.
The Mets' Juan Soto poses for pictures with family members during a press conference on Dec. 12, 2024, at Citi Field. Credit: EPA-EFE/Shutterstock/Sarah Yenesel
Starling Marte, who long has considered Soto, his countryman, as something of a mentee and friend, described Soto as “family-oriented.” Soto’s agent, Scott Boras, referred to the “Soto Supreme Court” of parents, siblings, uncles and other relatives as the committee that helped him decide on a team. As a rookie, when Soto saw Long’s wife seemingly in a dispute with a hotel front-desk attendant, he stopped to make sure she was OK — an example, Long said, of “a kind, caring soul,” even if he also is “a beast that’s going to throttle you as soon as he gets on the field.”
And then there is Joey Meneses, who was a career minor-leaguer when he became Soto’s loose acquaintance at best during spring training 2022. On Aug. 2 that year, the day the Nationals traded Soto to the Padres, Meneses got called up for his debut and saw Soto wheeling his suitcase out of the ballpark. This spring training, when they were teammates in Mets camp, Soto pulled up a chair and sat next to Meneses at his locker, just to hang for a bit.
“He told me something like, just joking, ‘Oh, they let me go because they had you.’ Yeah, right,” Meneses said. “He’s a superstar, he has the contract, he can be different. He’s not. He’s very humble. He talks to everybody like we’re people.”
Long said: “You could tell he was brought up the right way.”
‘A DH by then’
The mind-boggling financial figure is what it is. It’s difficult, maybe impossible, to make sense in practical terms of $765 million. But, really, the same is true for Pete Alonso’s $54 million (over two years) or Clay Holmes’ $38 million (over three years). Imagine making the minimum salary of $760,000? Major-league money is wild.
Similarly extreme is the duration of Soto’s contract: 15 years, also a baseball record. A decade and a half. What sort of player will a 40-going-on-41 Soto be?
“Uh, I think I’ll be a DH by then,” Soto said with a laugh. "But I don’t know. I hope he’s in a great spot, great shape — at least mentally — trying to do it one more time.”
Mets outfielder Juan Soto before a spring training game against the St. Louis Cardinals in Jupiter, Fla., on Feb. 23. Credit: Newsday/Alejandra Villa Loarca
To understand the length of the contract, work backward. Fifteen years ago, Soto was an 11-year-old pitcher, he said. Mike Pelfrey led Jerry Manuel’s Mets in innings pitched, and Wright slugged more than 25 home runs for the last time. Cohen hadn’t even tried to buy the Dodgers — yes, the Dodgers — yet.
So, yeah, a lot can and will happen over the life of Soto’s contract (if he doesn’t opt out after the fifth season).
“If I’m still doing this job, a lot has gone right,” said Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns, noting that his daughter, currently in kindergarten, will be a college upperclassman when Soto’s deal wraps up. “It’s a marriage. And both sides have to work hard at it to make it work.”
Soto’s pedigree is such that if he merely is mostly the same player for the first half of the contract, then mostly stays on the field in the second half, he is likely to go down as the Mets’ best hitter ever and one day don the club’s cap in Cooperstown.
That is why, for example, the Mets’ video during their first pitch to Soto concluded with the image of a Soto statue next to Tom Seaver’s outside Citi Field.
That is why Soto received this contract. The Mets didn’t buy just a player. They may have bought a legend.
“He earned it, he deserves it, he’s just got to play every day the way he’s been playing,” Long said. “That’s it. It’s not like he needs to do anything more.”
Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.
