The Mets and second baseman Jeff McNeil are in settlement on a four-year, $50MM contract extension, ESPN’s Jeff Passan stories. The contract incorporates a membership possibility for a fifth season, which may enable the extension to max out at $63.75MM over 5 years. The deal buys out the ultimate two arbitration seasons for the Paragon Sports activities Worldwide consumer, and the Mets will achieve management over what would’ve been McNeil’s first three free-agent seasons.
Unable to come back to phrases on a one-year wage for the upcoming season, McNeil and the Mets appeared headed towards an arbitration listening to. He’d filed for a $7.75MM wage on the heels of his first Nationwide League batting title in 2022, whereas the Mets had countered with a $6.25MM determine. These sums can now be thrown out, as McNeil’s last two arbitration years are locked in. If we depend 2023 on the $7MM midpoint of these two sums and determine McNeil may’ve earned anyplace from $12-13MM in what would’ve been his last arbitration season, the Mets are guaranteeing someplace within the neighborhood of a further $30MM to lock in two extra free-agent seasons and safe a fairly priced membership possibility on a 3rd free-agent 12 months.
McNeil, 31 in April, is now locked in by means of a minimum of his age-34 marketing campaign and probably his age-35 season. He’s recent off one of many most interesting seasons of his profession, having turned in a .326/.382/.454 batting line with 9 dwelling runs, 39 doubles, a triple and 4 stolen bases in 589 plate appearances. Unsurprisingly, that season earned him a second profession All-Star nod and gained him Silver Slugger honors within the Nationwide League — his first such award.
McNeil was one of many hardest strikeouts within the Majors, fanning in a career-low 10.4% of his plate appearances. He’s by no means walked a lot and didn’t change that in 2022 (6.8%), however it’s troublesome to argue with the outcomes. McNeil benefited to an extent from a career-high .353 common on balls in play, however even when that mark regresses towards the .324 mark he carried into the 2022 season, his bat-to-ball abilities and penchant for locating the gaps will enable him to stay the properly above-average hitter he was for almost all of the 2018-21 seasons.
The 2022 season was additionally very arguably the best defensive season of McNeil’s profession. Every of Defensive Runs Saved (3), Final Zone Ranking (3.5) and Outs Above Common (7) pegged him as a robust handler of the glove at second base. He additionally logged some transient time within the outfield corners (278 innings) and drew common or higher critiques for his work there, and he even chipped in a lone inning at third base for good measure. Second base will proceed to be his major dwelling on the diamond, however McNeil has proven prior to now that he’s a succesful third baseman, left fielder or proper fielder, which solely provides to his worth for the Mets.
In fact, since we’re discussing the Mets, the monetary ramifications of the contract prolong properly past the $50MM that McNeil himself will obtain. The Mets are already over the fourth and last luxury-tax barrier this season, that means any {dollars} they spend are taxed at a 90% clip. Had McNeil gained his arbitration listening to and secured a $7.75MM wage, that might’ve meant the Mets would’ve paid $6.975MM in taxes on his wage — bringing the full expenditure to $14.725MM. As an alternative, the Mets will now be taxed based mostly on the $12.5MM common annual worth of McNeil’s contract. Meaning they’ll pay $11.25MM in taxes on McNeil’s contract this 12 months — a rise of $4.275MM over what they’d have paid him had he gained an arbitration listening to.
There’s some down-the-road tax profit to extending McNeil — even past the plain worth in retaining a wonderful participant at an affordable price for the subsequent half decade. Had McNeil gained an arbitration listening to subsequent month — and coming off a batting title, he’d have had a robust case — he’d have landed that $7.75MM wage. With one other robust season, he’d fairly probably have been in for a elevate past the $12.5MM AAV of his present contract in his last arb season, when the Mets will doubtless once more be within the high tier of luxurious penalization (with overages being taxed at a 110% clip). The extension, then, may wind up saving the Mets $1MM or so off their luxurious ledger for the 2024 season — assuming McNeil has a wholesome and productive 2023 marketing campaign.
Setting apart any such trivia, the first profit to the Mets is just retaining a two-time All-Star and paying an annual price that, with good well being for McNeil, will doubtless clock in under his true open-market worth by the point the 2024-25 offseason rolls round. There’s actually some threat for the Mets, as one want solely take a look at McNeil’s pedestrian .251/.319/.360 batting line from 2021 to see that his lack of energy (outdoors of the juiced ball marketing campaign in 2019) leaves him with a reasonably tepid ground. The Mets already had management over McNeil’s age-31 and age-32 seasons, and it’s at all times potential that preemptively shopping for out a participant’s age-33 by means of age-35 seasons may look regrettable in hindsight.
That mentioned, the aforementioned ’21 marketing campaign is the lone below-average offensive season of McNeil’s profession, and his contact abilities and defensive aptitude at a number of positions determine to make him a perennially helpful participant even into his mid-30s. It’s not real looking to anticipate him to copy his 2022 manufacturing within the years forward, however there’s little purpose to assume this deal will flip into some type of egregious misstep, both.
McNeil now joins Max Scherzer ($43MM), Justin Verlander ($43MM), Francisco Lindor ($34.1MM), Brandon Nimmo ($20.5MM), Starling Marte ($20.75MM), Edwin Diaz ($21.25MM), Kodai Senga ($15MM), Jose Quintana ($13MM) and Tomas Nido ($2.1MM) as gamers locked into their 2024 salaries.
Assuming an excellent distribution of McNeil’s wage, that’d come out to simply over $225MM assured to 10 gamers, with one other 4 membership choices (Mark Canha, Eduardo Escobar, Brooks Raley, Darin Ruf), two participant choices (Omar Narvaez, Adam Ottavino) and a nine-player arbitration class headlined by Pete Alonso all doubtlessly including to the invoice.
