On the verge of his first season with the New York Mets, Juan Soto said his move last winter to sign with his former team’s crosstown rival — one that made Soto the highest-paid player in professional sports history — was a “family decision.”
“I can’t complain about Yankee fans. They were amazing, day in, day out, the whole season last year,” Soto told NBC’s “TODAY” in an interview that aired Monday.
“And I really appreciate not only Yankees fans but the Dominican community. They were showing off and I was really happy for that.”
In his lone season with the Yankees, the 26-year-old outfielder and four-time All-Star hit a career-high 41 home runs. A little more than one month after the Yankees’ season ended with a World Series loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers, Soto signed a 15-year contract with the Mets in December worth $765 million, a contract that topped that of Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani as the richest in MLB history. And a clause in the contract could allow the deal to surpass $800 million, according to ESPN.
Was there anything more the Yankees could have done to re-sign Soto?
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“I mean, they tried the hardest they can but things happen, you know?” Soto told “TODAY.” “You gotta go through a lotta things. It’s a whole group, family decision that we made. And I think that was the best one, you know? They really tried but we couldn’t get it done.”
Soto has already played in two World Series in the first seven years of his career and will now try to lead the Mets to their first title since 1986. The Mets tied for second in their division last season, beat Milwaukee in a wild-card series and Philadelphia in a National League Division Series before ultimately losing to the Dodgers in the National League Championship Series in six games.
The Mets are “really close to go back to the top,” Soto said. “We have what we need to be up there, so I don’t have … I’m not a magician that I’m gonna tell you what is gonna happen this year, but we’re gonna be up there.”
Players as proven as Soto rarely are available to sign as free agents this early in their careers, Mets general manager David Stearns told CNBC in January. It made for a rare opportunity to sign “a generational ballplayer,” Mets owner Steve Cohen said in December. Soto said he understood the size of the deal will lead to big expectations for him and his new club.
The Mets agreed to Soto’s record-breaking contract “for who I am so I’m gonna keep being who I am,” Soto said. “That’s the biggest thing for me. I don’t want to try to do more, I’m not gonna try to put a building on my back. I just gotta keep doing whatever I’ve been doing since day one. So I think that’s how I keep the pressure out of my way.”
