A week ago, Carlos Correa was set to sign with the Giants on what would have been a record contract for a shortstop. On Wednesday morning, baseball fans woke up to the stunning news that he will, instead, join the Mets after some late-night negotiating by New York owner Steve Cohen.
San Francisco was set to introduce Correa as its huge offseason acquisition on Tuesday morning, but delayed the proceedings after concerns about his physical exam, according to a report by the Associated Press.
Overnight, Cohen—who is in Hawai’i—swooped in to negotiate a 12-year, $315 million deal with Correa’s agent Scott Boras.
Sports Illustrated‘s Tom Verducci reports that the deal between Correa and the Giants broke down around 1 p.m. PT, when the team told Boras that they were not prepared to fulfill the Letter of Agreement reached by the two sides, reopening Correa’s free agency. After reaching out to other teams, he spent “four or five hours” in negotiations with Cohen, finalizing the deal early Wednesday morning, Eastern time.
The Mets were reportedly involved in Correa talks before his agreement with the Giants, laying the groundwork for the eventual deal. “We kind of picked up where we were before and it just worked out,” Cohen told Jon Heyman of the New York Post.
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The Mets had already made numerous splashes this offseason. The team replaced the departed Jacob deGrom with reigning AL Cy Young winner Justin Verlander, bolstered the pitching staff with Japanese star Kodai Senga and veteran José Quintana, added David Robertson and re-signed Edwin Díaz and Adam Ottavino to the bullpen and signed outfielder Brandon Nimmo to an eight-year deal that could keep him with the Mets for the rest of his career.
Even with those moves, Cohen saw a hole in the lineup and told Heyman the team was one bat away before landing Correa.
“This really makes a big difference,” he said. “I felt like our pitching was in good shape. We needed one more hitter. This puts us over the top.”
The extra $315 million—along with further record luxury tax penalties—don’t seem to be a major consideration for Cohen either.
“What the heck’s the difference? If you’re going to make the move, make the move,” he told Heyman.
With the move, Cohen has pushed the Mets’ total offseason spending to over $800 million in free-agent contracts.
