Pete Alonso Deserves Better than the Mets

Should you spend any time in New York and find yourself listening to sports talk radio, the topic of New York Mets first baseman Pete Alonso’s impending free agency is sure to be broached. Some are in favor, while some seem opposed and deem a trade the necessary route. What exactly could a contract look like for Alonso?

Alonso was the club’s second-round pick in the 2016 MLB Draft out of Florida, where he starred for three seasons. Bursting on the scene with a league-leading 53 home runs in his 2019 rookie season, Alonso has had a lock on first base in Queens since his debut in March 2019. In 648 games across five seasons, Alonso has belted 192 home runs to go with a .251/.342/.528 slash line, good for a 136 OPS+ overall. Alonso’s defense has slowly improved from looking the other way to hardly noticeable in the same timeframe.

Now, if you have made it this far into the article, you may find yourself asking where the hesitation would be in offering Alonso a lucrative extension? Well, for one, Alonso will turn 30 this calendar year, and large-framed first basemen are not the most graceful agers. After hiring the notorious Scott Boras as his new agent, all signs point to Alonso seeking a long, rich contract. The super-agent was guarded when asked about negotiations between the Polar Bear and the Mets.

To begin, let’s find some comparisons to Alonso’s situation. Paul Goldschmidt owns the second-highest AAV amongst first basemen at $26 million. Goldschmidt also signed his current contract at 31, just one year older than Alonso will be in free agency. The St. Louis Cardinals felt comfortable signing that deal thanks to Goldschmidt’s contact ability and defense. The Texas State product tied for sixth this past season in Outs Above Average by first basemen with three. For comparison, Alonso was worth zero Outs Above Average. Strike one. Goldschmidt has been worth 5.6 rWAR per 162 games in his career, while Alonso clocks in at 4.1 rWAR per 162 games. Strike two.

Rhys Hoskins commanded $17 million AAV in his recent contract with Milwaukee, but the former Phillie just missed all of 2023 with a torn ACL. Still, Hoskins represents the lower end of a contract for Alonso. Besides being NL East rivals for four seasons, the two possess similar skill sets. Hoskins has a ton of power and walks at a 13.5% clip. Alonso’s advantage comes in the field, where Hoskins has been “worth” negative 13 Outs Above Average since 2017. Rough is an understatement. Using WAR, Hoskins has been worth 2.7 rWAR per 162 games, over a full point less than Alonso. Based on these factors, Alonso will likely command more than the $17 million AAV that Hoskins earned.

FanGraphs’ ZIPS projections see the approaching cliff for Alonso and have proceeded to not-so-gently shove Alonso off that cliff in the next three seasons. After posting a 2.8 fWAR in 2023 (FanGraphs heavily weighs batting average in their calculation), ZIPS projects Alonso to accumulate just 6.7 fWAR from 2024-2026. Ben Clemens of FanGraphs noted that teams were paying roughly $8.5 million per 1 WAR in the 2021-22 offseason. Accounting for inflation and market fluctuation, let’s assume that figure increases to roughly $10 million per 1 WAR this offseason. Using those calculations, Alonso would be worth roughly $70 million over the next three seasons.

With Boras leading the negotiations, there is almost zero chance that Alonso would settle for a three-year contract. Let’s push it to six seasons, reasonable given Alonso’s age and the possibility at a second free-agency frenzy. Six seasons at $25 million AAV would comfortably put Alonso in the top five of first baseman paydays. After the spending that Steve Cohen has done in his few years as owner of the Mets, $150 million seems like chump change.

At his height, Alonso would likely be worth the $25 million and more. So, what happened last season? Somehow, despite chasing less, Alonso whiffed more and lost contact quality. In a vacuum, those will lead to a bit of a setback. Alonso, while chasing less, still struck at a higher rate in 2023 than he did in 2022. But wait, Alonso’s xwOBA was 15 points higher in 2023 than in 2022. This sounds a bit optimistic, but Alonso may have just been very unlucky. His BABIP, which is around .300 for the league average, plummeted to a measly .205 in 2023. Ouch. Not so fast yet again. BABIP is also influenced by the quality of contact (in general, higher exit velocities result in higher BABIP). While falling just 0.3 mph, Alonso’s average exit velocity dropped from the 66th percentile in 2022 to the 55th percentile in 2023. Adding to his 2023 struggles, Alonso’s whiff and strikeout rates on breaking balls, specifically sliders and changeups, jumped up rather significantly.

Two players who had relatively similar whiff rates to Alonso are Rafael Devers and Josh Bell. These two have been cherry-picked for a reason. More on that later. Devers is on the short list of most dangerous left-handed hitters in the league. Even with a whiff rate of 26.1%, Devers struck out less than 20 percent of the time and posted a strong 3.1 fWAR. The biggest difference between Devers and Alonso is the quality of their contact. Devers posted a ridiculous 93.1 mph average exit velocity, which ranked in the 95th percentile. As for Bell, his .247 batting average and awful defense dragged his fWAR to 0.4. Still, with a whiff rate of 25.8%, Bell was able to post a .325 on-base, seven points higher than Alonso, thanks to his discernible eye. Bell walked at a 10.2% clip, comfortably above the big-league average.

So what is the path forward to a productive season for Alonso and a potential payday? There seem to be a couple of routes that Alonso could pursue. For one, improving his contact quality could allow his special power to play more. This is easier said than done, but Driveline Baseball in Kent, WA has seemed to find success training this in recent seasons. With Alonso whiffing on roughly a quarter of his swings, capitalizing on the times he makes contact could lead to a more 2019-esque statline. Coincidentally, 2019 was Alonso’s second-highest average exit velocity. The second path towards a bigger payday could be swinging less. Hear me out here. Alonso whiffs too much on breaking balls and other offspeed pitches, and even big leaguers are not living in the zone. If, and this is a big if, Alonso can lay off some of those nasty offspeed pitches, we could see his walk rate climb back into double-digits.

These past thousand words or so may have you questioning just how good Pete Alonso really is. Well, Alonso is good. Like, top 5-10 first basemen in the game good. Should his production merely repeat from 2023 to the end of his contract, Alonso could justify about $30 million per season. Will the Mets go there? The $25 million AAV I mentioned earlier seems like a reasonable compromise, assuming the club wants to stay around $20 million AAV and Boras is seeking $30 million. Six seasons at $150 million total, maybe some incentives for All-Star games and an MVP, who says no first? If the Mets say no, teams should line themselves up to match that total.