Buck Showalter not feeling pressure with Mets' record payroll
Mets manager Buck Showalter sits on the lap of former player and current announcer Todd Zeile as Brandon Nimmo looks on at the Kids Holiday Party at Citi Field, Thursday, Dec. 15, 2022. Credit: Corey Sipkin
Brandon Nimmo, only minutes after being reintroduced Thursday as a $162 million Met, changed into an elf costume. Angela Showalter, the manager’s wife, was decked out as Mrs. Claus for the team’s annual holiday party at Citi Field.
And Showalter himself? He only went as far as the Santa cap, donning the more familiar No. 11 royal blue game jersey. Buck mentioned he only goes full Claus for the grandkids, preferring semi-business attire while at the stadium.
Left unsaid was the rather large bull's-eye Showalter is sporting on his back heading into the 2023 season, along with everyone else associated with the Mets, a team spending at a rate never before seen in Major League Baseball. When you have the top payroll in the sport, people take notice. When it’s nearly $100 million more than the second-place club, in this case the Yankees, that buys you more than just attention.
It makes the Mets a target as well. Playing in New York always comes with heightened expectations, but we’ve never seen a team saddled with a $430 million price tag before (including the luxury-tax bill). Or a manager.
This a new frontier for the Mets, and owner Steve Cohen has used his billions to create a supervillain franchise in the eyes of opposing clubs, a dynamic not lost on another one of the sport’s polarizing forces: Nimmo’s agent, Scott Boras.
“Our game needs Goliaths,” Boras said Thursday. “We have to have Goliaths. You can envision Steve Cohen hanging onto the Empire State Building. There he is! And maybe it’s not Steve Cohen — it’s Steve Kong.”
Cohen is used to being Goliath. The Mets? Not so much. We knew the franchise’s image would be forever changed by his purchase, but at field level, it’s the same game — only now involving more expensive players wearing blue-and-orange. Even Showalter, a baseball lifer with three decades of managerial experience, had to acknowledge the seismic events happening in Queens. But when I asked him about the increased pressure for the coming season — both on him and the clubhouse — Showalter explained the runaway spending as a necessary response to the Mets’ “unique situation” this winter.
With a roster stripped by free agency, and a farm system still very much under development, Showalter described a scenario in which the Mets really didn’t have much choice but to lean on Cohen’s riches to keep them competitive. The club’s two biggest contracts this offseason involved retaining two core players: Nimmo and Edwin Diaz (five years, $102 million).
Beyond that, the Mets plugged holes with high-end replacements: Justin Verlander ($86.6M) for Jacob deGrom, Kodai Senga ($75M) for Chris Bassitt, Jose Quintana ($26M) for Taijuan Walker. General manager Billy Eppler is still working on the depleted bullpen after signing David Robertson ($10M) and trading for Brooks Raley, the former Rays lefty who Showalter views as a brilliant addition.
“Everybody gets bogged down in one year,” Showalter said of the team’s massive '23 payroll. “I know where the endgame is down the road.”
Showalter was referring to Cohen literally buying time for the maturing of prospects while fortifying the roster with long-term pillars, like Francisco Lindor and now Nimmo. Incredibly, Senga, who won’t even be introduced until next week, has the longest contract of any starting pitcher, as he’s signed through 2027 (with an opt-out after three years). Verlander, Quintana and Max Scherzer are only guaranteed to be Mets for the next two seasons.
The again, we’re still a week away from Christmas. The Mets won’t play games that count for another three months, so it’s difficult to gauge the heat on this team here in the icy chill of December. Plus, this doesn’t feel anything like baseball at the moment. Cohen has turned this winter into a dizzying series of business transactions, leaving the rest of us furiously tapping on calculators to figure out an ever-changing payroll and luxury-tax computations.
But as much as I tried to press Showalter on the psychological burden of what could be a half-billion-dollar payroll — after all, he still has a 1-5 record in playoff series — the manager nudged back on his job actually being easier. He pointed out that Cohen’s checkbook removed two of the greatest stressors from any manager’s routine: determining that day’s leadoff hitter and closer. The Mets have arguably the two best answers to those questions in Nimmo and Diaz.
“They passed the ‘feel’ test for me,” Showalter said. “That really feels good. I don’t have to start moving around the lineup for a leadoff guy, I don’t have to start talking about [Starling] Marte in center, which I really didn’t want to do . . . And same thing with Edwin at the back of the bullpen. We signed the first guy that hits and the last guy that pitches. But you’ve got to do a lot in between.”
The Mets still have plenty of time to work on that. And Cohen’s cash at their disposal. But as far as that payroll pressure goes, with a stacked NL East gunning for them, Showalter doesn’t seem fazed by any of those factors. Or he’s doing a great job disguising it.
“We won’t be boring, that’s for sure,” Showalter said, smiling.
David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball's Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.
