Juan Soto's 15-year deal has short-term benefits that outweigh long-term risks, experts say

The Mets and Steve Cohen didn’t just agree to sign Juan Soto to a history-making contract Sunday evening. In convincing the young superstar free agent to sign with them for three-quarters of a billion dollars, they may have changed the baseball landscape for good, sports business experts said.

Soto, 26, who agreed to the largest guaranteed contract in North American sports history at 15 years and $765 million, may be costing baseball’s richest owner a whole lot of money, but he also stands to elevate the franchise, increase ticket sales, provide profitable merchandising opportunities and raise television ratings for the team’s flagship network, SNY, said Mark Conrad, professor of law and ethics at Fordham University and the director of its sports business concentration.

And that alone might be enough to mitigate the fact that Soto presumably will be a Met into his age-40 season (that is, if he doesn’t exercise the fifth-year player opt-out that the team can void by tacking on an extra $4 million a year to his last 10 years).

“We passed reasonableness tens of millions of dollars ago, one can argue,” Conrad said. “It’s what the market will bear, and there are going to be a lot of subtleties, non-field aspects, to the deal that would be attractive to the Mets because, one, Mr. Cohen certainly can afford it, given the wealth that he has, and, two, it puts the Mets, really for the first time, in a generation as the star team in New York, or at least equal to the Yankees.

“I think the buzz will be even bigger [than the one surrounding the Yankees] . . . Citi Field could really be the place to be.”

Long-term effects

Though there is always worry that a deal this lengthy will age poorly, for now, Cohen “spent $750 million to get a billion back in value,” said former sports agent Robert Boland, who now is a sports attorney and professor at Seton Hall University Law School.

“You hope a little bit that at the end of that deal, either you’re in a position where you can buy it out or he’s still producing and playing and salaries have just gone up around it,” Boland said. “A lot of this is what I would describe as the ‘irrational marketplace of free agency,’ where timing, resources and perceived need all kind of roll into the outcome . . . It’s not the value of the player rationally, it’s the value of the need.”

Soto’s deal differs greatly from Shohei Ohtani’s, whose 10-year, $700 million contract with the Dodgers previously was the highest in baseball. Unlike Ohtani, none of Soto’s money is deferred. That puts the average annual value of Soto’s contract at $51 million, all of which speeds the Mets toward luxury tax penalties.

The team had plenty of money come off the books this offseason, but Soto’s contract puts their current 2025 payroll at close to $225 million, according to the sports financial website Spotrac, with next season’s luxury tax threshold set at $241 million. That means the Mets will be charged a 50% penalty for every dollar they spend over $241 million, and Soto’s contract makes it more likely that this could be a yearly occurrence.

“Fifteen years is an awfully long time and you’re really paying for the first or earlier part of the contract [before Soto’s production begins to wane due to age],” Conrad said. “But I think Cohen was saying, ‘Look, I’m investing for now. I’m investing for the next three to five years.’

“I think for somebody of his wealth, he was willing to do it and go as far as he could. And I think certainly, for Mets fans, for New York, it really seems to be a win-win. Whether it will be that way in the long term, time will tell.”

Sign of things to come?

Conrad and Boland also said this could be a game-changer for baseball at large. Two years ago, Aaron Judge’s nine-year, $360 million signing was the big landmark. Then came Ohtani. And now there’s Soto, who, because he’s a generational talent who hit free agency at an atypically young age, was always going to command a hefty paycheck.

And though Juan Soto types don’t come along every year, there’s always going to be a blockbuster signing, and his deal could very well start a trend, thanks in part to baseball’s shifting financial landscape.

In the next few years, there is likely to be more money coming into baseball teams through television and streaming deals, Conrad said, and with Cohen’s billions looming large, it’s possible that owners will commit some of that increased revenue to player salaries.

That, though, is assuming that Cohen’s spending doesn’t push baseball toward a salary cap — something owners have failed to achieve thus far because of resistance from the players association. That lack of a cap benefits teams that are willing to spend.

Baseball has used the luxury tax to curb spending, but with the current collective bargaining agreement set to expire at midnight on Dec. 1, 2026, there will at least be discussion of creating a cap before the 2027 season. The three other major sports leagues have one.

“I think other owners can’t be thrilled about this, because it’s really what they feared about having somebody with this kind of money to do that,” Conrad said. “But it’s very possible that in four or five years, this may not be the highest contract.”  

What about other moves?

There also will be a ripple effect on the Mets, though Cohen’s largesse might be enough to counteract some of that. They still need pitching, and they still have to decide whether to re-sign Pete Alonso, whose contract won’t be cheap. Soto’s deal will be a hit to their flexibility there.

“You can’t really come back from [15 years] quickly . . . and you’ve got to hope [Soto] is everything he appears to be,” Boland said. “You’re going to have to maybe make a choice between a cheaper pitcher now or try to do more [with what you have]. Your pitchers may all have to forevermore be one-year rentals or under-control rookies.”

The Mets may even steer toward six- and seven-man rotations made up of cheaper talent. All of that jibes with how president of baseball operations David Stearns generally operates. He has historically leaned toward shorter-term deals for pitchers and managed two successful reclamation projects with Sean Manaea and Luis Severino, who came relatively cheap last year and overperformed expectations. Manaea is a free agent and Severino signed with the A’s last week.

Cohen’s money, though, doesn’t make that a guarantee.

“He’s already endured humongous luxury tax implications that didn’t get a result [by not yet winning a championship],” Boland said. “[The Soto deal is not something you can keep doing, but I think it certainly opens the door for [the Mets to sign] one or more players, though I think it’s going to require the team then to be conscious of how long those deals are.”

Conrad agreed, saying: “I don’t see how this would stop him, unless it would be another huge deal like this, or even a long-term deal . . . He may be thinking twice about [longer deals], but if there are free-agent pitchers out there that he wants and he feels it’s worth it to get a championship, I don’t think the money will stop him.”

By Laura Albanese

laura.albanese@newsday.com@AlbaneseLaura

Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.