The Mets spent the last week pondering a move that would make them the first-ever $300 million roster.
They have discussed acquiring Eric Hosmer and Chris Paddack from the Padres for Dominic Smith. The Athletic first reported on the potential.
The Mets would essentially take over the last four years and owe Hosmer $59 million to gain access to further starting depth with Paddack now – and in the future. They considered the move even before Jacob deGrom reported pain in his shoulder and eventually discovered a stress reaction in his shoulder blade that won’t keep him from playing in the majors until late May at the earliest.
The Mets would take the average value of Hosmer’s $18 million contract (based on his full eight-year contract at $144 million) plus the $2.25 million owed to Paddack for 2022 . The Mets are currently projecting a payroll of about $288 million for luxury tax purposes. So adding about $20 million more would put them over $300 million, although it’s always possible that San Diego could eat up part of Hosmer’s contract to facilitate a trade and change the Mets’ luxury tax. The team’s luxury tax record was $297.5 million from the Dodgers in 2015.
Eric Hosmer, Getty Images
This is a thorny issue in the wake of a new collective bargaining agreement that gave the other owners a new fourth super tax threshold of $290 million in hopes of tying up the Mets in particular. It quickly became known as the Steve Cohen tax.
Because he’s heard complaints from other owners about the $300 million mark, even Cohen has hesitated about breaking that number. The Dodgers are valued at about $292 million this season, according to Fangraphs after flipping AJ Pollock for Craig Kimbrel on Friday.
Like the 2015 Dodgers, who were still in the early years of a new owner, Cohen is trying to use his money to speed up relevance and contention while providing cover to improve a minor-league feeding system.
The Mets believe their biggest pain point in 2022 was the beginning of pitching depth, particularly due to age/injury concerns at Carlos Carrasco, deGrom and Max Scherzer. DeGrom has already made that fear a reality.
Chris Paddack, Getty Images
Chris Bassit was brought in to join Taijuan Walker after the lockout for the most ideal depth of rotation. But the Mets now know they need to dig deep to get the season started.
Paddack would join Tylor Megill, David Peterson and – sometime later in the year – Joey Lucchesi to provide rotation options for 2022. Additionally, Bassit, Carrasco, deGrom, and Walker can all be free agents after the 2022 season. Paddack was eligible for arbitration only for the first time.
Paddack is not a sure thing. He had a strong rookie season in 2019, winning 9-7 with a 3.33 ERA. But he had a 4.73 ERA in 12 starts in the COVID-shortened 2020 season. And it was a 5.07 ERA in 23 appearances (22 starts) last season for the disappointing Padres. Paddack, who underwent Tommy John surgery with the minors, was shut down in September with a minor sprain to his right elbow, the team said. He came to this camp in a battle for fifth rotation with recently signed Nick Martinez.
Paddack, 26, is known for having an inconsistent fastball and excellent transition. A big question was if he could ever build consistency with a breaking ball to have a viable third place.
Paddack’s 2019 rookie season included an altercation with Pete Alonso. Both made the opening day lists that year and had excellent Aprils. Alonso was named NL Rookie of the Month. Paddack responded by saying, “I’m coming for him,” noting that the goal was Rookie of the Year (which Alonso won), not Rookie of the Month. The two faced each other on May 6th. Alonso went 3-0 with two strikeouts against Paddack, who celebrated his two punchouts quite clearly.
Dominic Smith, Corey Sipkin
After that, Alonso kicked things up a notch by telling reporters: “If he was mad about it (not being NL rookie of the month) there’s five more months to go. … He also said something about winning Rookie of the Year. That would be nice, but I’m trying to win a World Series.”
Since Paddack was raised at the start of the 2019 season, he has exactly three years of service plus three options. So if the Mets send him to the minors for more than two weeks this year, he would transition from a free agent to a post-2025 campaign wait after the 2024 season.
Hosmer, 32, would become a slightly more expensive, limited Smith – a left-hander who can make Alonso the designated batsman with some regularity. While Smith also played some outfield corners, Hosmer has 25 career innings in outfield and not since 2015. That was the year the Royals beat the Mets in a World Series in which the signature play arguably followed Hosmer’s shot Home was to tie Game 5 first baseman Lucas Duda threw wildly at the plate.
Hosmer signed that eight-year, $144 million free-agent deal with San Diego after the 2017 season, and his performance as Padre was ordinary; Perhaps most surprisingly, Boy Scouts cite how his defense has taken a noticeable step backwards. The team has been trying to trade him in to cut salary and pursue other areas of need for at least a year, and Hosmer was upset at how public his availability had become.
The Padres attempted to sign Nelson Cruz, Eddie Rosario, Kyle Schwarber and Seiya Suzuki this offseason and traded with Cincinnati for Jesse Winker. They’d like to add another field bat with the money saved from a Hosmer deal.