Agent Scott Boras quite fond of Mets owner Steve Cohen
Agent Scott Boras, left, General Manager Billy Eppler, second from left, and manager Buck Showalter, right, look on as New York Met Brandon Nimmo gives remarks at a press conference announcing his re-signing to the team at Citi Field, Thursday, Dec. 15, 2022, in Queens. Credit: Corey Sipkin
You know who is a big fan of the team owner spending historically large amounts of money on baseball players?
The guy who has built a highly successful career convincing team owners to spend large amounts of money on baseball players.
Two years into Steve Cohen’s tenure as Mets owner, he has developed a strong working relationship with agent Scott Boras that Boras seems to enjoy very much.
“Our game needs Goliaths. We have to have Goliaths,” Boras said Thursday at Citi Field, where he attended the news conference for Brandon Nimmo’s eight-year, $162 million contract. “You can envision Steve Cohen hanging onto the Empire State Building. It’s maybe not Steve Cohen. It’s maybe Steve Kong.”
Boras called back to his old supermarket analogy, which he used to razz the former owners, the Wilpons, by saying they shopped in the “fruit and nuts aisle.”
But these Mets?
“They’re pretty much always after the premiums of the store,” Boras said. “No doubt.”
Or as Nimmo described the change between the old Mets and new Mets: “It’s been eye-opening, it’s been crazy and a little bit surreal to go through.”
With a 2023 payroll of about $350 million, Cohen is using money to make up for what the organization lacks in homegrown talent in filling their many holes created by free agency. He has expressed as much to Boras, the agent said.
“There’s a real fight in overcoming something that he inherited,” Boras said. “And that is the organizational talent depth has been a problem. He knows he has to do more at the major-league and free-agent level to address that, and he’s very clear about it. Always trying to make sure that this year’s team is as competitive as it should be, understanding that he has to pull in the free-agent area more than he’d like to, more than he’d want to. While that is something that probably any owner wouldn’t want to do, he does it because it means if I don’t do it, I won’t be competitive.”
Conforto update
Former Mets outfielder Michael Conforto, noted friend of Nimmo, is healthy and looking for a short-term contract with an opt-out clause, according to Boras.
He became a free agent last offseason but never signed with a team after suffering a shoulder injury that required surgery.
“Michael is in Arizona, doing great,” Boras said. “He’s throwing normally again, back to full health, hitting great and we’re talking to a number of teams about him right now.”
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.
