Why aren’t Pete Alonso and Alex Bregman signed? Scott Boras weighs in

On By Littum

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PHOENIX – Agent Scott Boras, who represents the two biggest free-agent MLB stars still unsigned, had to look only a few feet to his right Wednesday afternoon to illuminate his position this winter.

Spring training starts in just a month, and All-Star third baseman Alex Bregman and All-Star first baseman Pete Alonso continue to look in on the outside with no idea where they’ll be playing in 2025.

Boras has argued all winter that plenty of teams have the money to meet the demands of Bregman and Alonso, and for proof he needed to look no further than starter Corbin Burnes, who was introduced Wednesday after signing a six-year, $210 million contract. the Arizona Diamondbacksthe largest contract in franchise history.

And, last time anyone checked, no one has ever confused the Diamondbacks with a big-market club with massive TV rights.

So if the Diamondbacks can afford to sign Burnes, Boras argues, there should be absolutely no excuses for others not to pursue and sign Bregman and Alonso to lucrative contracts.

There is certainly plenty of interest in both players, but if someone actually offered a deal that they believe is worth their true value, they would have been signed before the holidays.

Alonso, who has spent his entire career with the New York Mets and turned down a seven-year, $158 million contract through 2023, sought a deal bigger than Freddie Freeman’s six-year, $162 million contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers and Matt Olson’s contract. eight-year, $168 million deal with Atlanta.

Now he’s willing to sign a three-year deal with opt-outs to stay with the Mets, but they’re still at an impasse.

Given how the Mets have played hardball in these negotiations with Alonso and are willing to let him go if he doesn’t live up to their price, the question now is just how much damage has been done in their relationship?

“I don’t want to address preemptive questions about that,” Boras said. “You’ll have to ask Pete how he wants to feel and what he wants to do. He’s just in the marketplace listening right now.

“The teams are now getting a little more definition of their teams, so I think things will shift.”

While Alonso might be willing to accept a short-term deal with the option to opt out after the 2025 season, Bregman isn’t going that route. He has no desire to accept a short-term contract and remains committed to several teams such as the Toronto Blue Jays, Detroit Tigers and Boston Red Sox.

“Bregman is a championship player, stick with it,” Boras said. “It’s really a matter of his decision-making and theirs, of how to close that gap. There is considerable interest (in long-term) agreements.”

The qualifying offer attached to Bregman and Alonso certainly has a negative effect, Boras said, but he also points out that teams haven’t used this winter the way they have in the past.

“You see so many teams that don’t actually spend money,” Boras said. “They’re making more, but they’re not spending. They’re spending far less than they did two, three years ago. There’s a quadrant as many as 10 to 12 teams that are in that position. …

“That gradation of being an owner has a different definition than it did 10, 15 years ago, ironically because of the appreciation of franchise value.”

There are only seven teams that have increased their payroll by more than $10 million from a year ago, according to FanGraphs.

And one of those teams happens to be the Diamondbacks, who spent $22.5 million more than a year ago, with an estimated payroll of $193 million this season.

“We have the potential to be a championship team,” Diamondbacks managing partner Ken Kendrick said. “Our job is to try and do everything we can to put the best team on the field that we can afford. We’re stretching the budget. It won’t be the last time we ever do that.

“But my view on investing money is that you invest it when you have the opportunity to get a return. We are making a significant investment in a fantastic young player and I hope for our fans and myself personally that I would like to have further success before I walk off into the sunset. So we’ll see how it works.”

The Diamondbacks had no real interest in Burnes, the best pitcher on the market when free agency began. They simply thought the price tag would be too high and there were several teams willing to pay Burnes at least $245 million.

Still, Burnes asked Boras to call the Diamondbacks again the week before Christmas to say how much he wanted to pitch for them, allowing him to stay home in Phoenix, where he has lived since 2018. He was willing to leave at least $35 million. on the table to be at home year-round with his wife, 3-year-old son and 6-month-old twins.

He still vividly remembers the anxiety last summer of taking a private plane home after a takeoff in Baltimore to be with his wife for the birth of their twins, only for the plane to experience mechanical difficulties, leaving him stranded in Colorado Springs at 2:30 in the morning. He ended up driving to Denver, took the first Southwest flight out of Denver to Phoenix, and had a car drive him immediately from the airport to the hospital just 45 minutes before his wife gave birth.

“It was a really tough time for him last year,” Boras said. “The trip was really wearing on him. For the Burnes family, it was very clear to me how much he wanted to be with his children, around his family, his grandparents. …

“It’s kind of hard to go to a player and say, ‘Let me do my best to help you earn less,’ but the reality is that Corbin would do anything to be with his family.”

Said Burnes, who flew home to Phoenix six to eight times last summer to be with his family: “The family aspect was huge for us. When we heard this was going to be an opportunity, we had to jump on it. It is something we dreamed about.”

Just like that, the Diamondbacks hope to recreate the days when they had Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling at the top of their rotation, which led them to the 2001 World Series championship – now with Burnes and Zac Gallen together.

“Our fans in this community support winning teams,” Kendrick said. “They don’t necessarily act like Chicago Cubs fans — no disrespect. They support their team no matter what.

“In Arizona, they have a history of having winners. We’re going to continue to try to build revenue and reinvest it into the quality that we put on the field.”

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