Expectations for 2025 Mets: Out of this world

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — Near the end of the high-stakes, high-cost negotiations that he was not sure were going anywhere, Steve Cohen faced a big question — maybe the remaining question that mattered most, since they already largely had figured out the dollars and cents and sense.

Juan Soto, about to choose the Mets and receive the richest contract in sports history, sought to know how many World Series titles Cohen wanted to win over the next decade.

Cohen, the owner of a franchise that has won it all twice in 63 years of existence, decided to go bold: two to four.

It was a test. Cohen passed. His answer was “huge,” Soto said, in his decision to come to Queens.

“I wanted to see if he’s willing to win. I wanted to see if he’s willing to see me in my prime and help me, surround me with a team to win a World Series,” Soto, 26, said. “I wanted to see how much he is willing to want it. I wanted to know if he’s going to be willing to win one and then that’s it. Or if he’s going to be winning one and want another one and want another one.”

That fleeting exchange amid a larger conversation in South Florida — the second of two in-person meetings during the weekslong courtship of Soto, who signed a 15-year, $765 million deal — represented a paradigm shift. Cohen raised the bar. The team’s expectations changed, maybe forever.

As the Mets open a new season Thursday against the Astros in Houston, with Soto as their headliner, rightfielder and No. 2 hitter, success no longer is measured merely in wins. It is measured by wins in October.

The rest of the Mets are in on that.

“When you go out and you get a player like Juan Soto, it’s the same as the (Shohei) Ohtani contract,” said Brandon Nimmo, the Mets’ longest-tenured player. “Anything less than a World Series — or in Steve’s words, two to four — is not worth the investment.”

Francisco Lindor, widely regarded alongside Nimmo as the clubhouse leader, echoed: “I agree. I agree. I agree. That should be the expectation. (Cohen is) putting a lot of time, a lot of effort, a lot of money into it . . . In his next 10 years — and hopefully I’m here seven out of those 10, that’s what I have guaranteed — hopefully we’re in the playoffs every year. That’s what I want. Consistent: boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Anything can happen in the playoffs. The goal should be winning, not just being somewhat good.”

And Francsico Alvarez, whom the Mets hope is their catcher for at least most of that span: “It’s what I want too. I don’t want to win just a World Series. I want to win a couple. If we win one, we gotta think about the next one, you know?”

Cohen touched on a similar sentiment during a mid-March appearance in Mets camp, when it was easier to think and speak clearly, without the clouding emotion of a superstar pursuit or the mid-February start of spring training.

“If you can win the first one, you can build on it,” he said. “You know what it feels like.”

He noted that as disappointing as it was last autumn when the Mets lost to the Dodgers in the National League Championship Series, falling two wins shy of the Fall Classic, even getting that far was momentous. It was more than a silver lining. The franchise hadn’t so much as won a playoff series in almost a decade, before any of these Mets were on the team, so it was a new experience for almost everybody.

Now, they can build on it. They sort of know what it feels like.

To try to help the Mets take the next step, Cohen and president of baseball operations David Stearns went big over the offseason, spending more than $1 billion on free agents. In addition to Soto, they brought back Pete Alonso, Sean Manaea, Jesse Winker and Ryne Stanek from the fun-loving 2024 club, added Clay Holmes, Frankie Montas and Griffin Canning to the rotation and signed A.J. Minter as a late-innings bullpen arm.

Part of what made Minter attractive also was on Soto’s resume: They have been to and won the World Series. They know what it feels like.

“Whether you’re looking at it from a longer perspective like that or a year-to-year basis, that’s the goal: to win the World Series,” said David Peterson, the longest-tenured member of the rotation, having debuted in 2020. “Ever since Steve took over, the priority has been to make this a great place to play and a place that prioritizes winning. We want to bring a championship and multiple championships back to Queens.”

The Mets’ luxury-tax payroll going into 2025 stands at $325 million, beyond the so-called Steve Cohen Tax (beginning at $301 million) and well beyond what Cohen intended to spend entering the offseason.

He has said repeatedly in recent years that he does not want to fund rosters at this extreme level every year. It would be worth it in 2025, though, if the Mets snag the first of what he expects to be several championships.

Cohen has, of course, made similarly grand declarations before. In his first public comments as the Mets’ owner in late 2020, he said it would be “slightly disappointing” not to win a World Series in three to five years.

This is Year 5.

“Maybe it doesn’t happen this year, maybe it does,” Cohen said. “But if we keep putting ourselves in position the playoffs and to make a deep run, we’re going to win a World Series at some point.”

By Tim Healey

timothy.healey@newsday.com@timbhealey

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.