Juan Soto is the richest athlete in history courtesy of the biggest, baddest team in New York.

Honestly, it feels weird to write that sentence and not refer to the Yankees.

Not the first half, mind you. That part became straight-up factual on Sunday night when the 26-year-old Soto agreed to a 15-year, $765 million contract with the Mets.

Thus, one of the most anticipated free-agent sagas ever resulted in the largest contract not just in the history of Major League Baseball, but of all sports.

If Soto, a four-time All-Star with a .421 OBP and 201 home runs, is the talk of town in New York, Mets owner Steve Cohen might as well be the toast of it.

Even after back-to-back $300-plus million payrolls, the Soto deal is the ultimate sign that Cohen didn't become the wealthiest owner in MLB just to not play the part. And, really, what is $765 million when you're worth $21.3 billion?

As for the Yankees, well, they gave it a good try.

According to Jon Heyman of the New York Post, the Yankees' last bid to retain Soto was for 16 years and $760 million. That put the competition in hair-splitting territory, where the Yankees were supposed to have an advantage.

Yet is anyone actually, truly surprised that Soto chose the Mets?

Yesterday's New York Team vs. Tomorrow's New York Team

Neither Soto nor his agent, Scott Boras, have yet explained why the Mets were the pick. All we really know is how Soto celebrated, which involved a hot tub and some kind of bubbly.

However, one doesn't need to be a Holmes—be it Sherlock, Mycroft or the other newest Met, Clay—to deduce that Soto simply wanted to be a Met more than he wanted to be a Yankee.

It is weird to imagine anyone looking at the Yankees and feeling unconvinced. They are 27-time World Series champions, and Soto was just on a squad that went to the World Series.

If Soto had returned to the Bronx, he would have been together again with Aaron Judge. The two enjoyed a tremendous partnership in 2024, forming a bond not seen since the days of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig.

Then again, Soto's return to the Yankees now would have been akin to catching a ride on the Titanic right before it hit that iceberg.

Their history is nice and all, but what matters now is that the Yankees just got their butts whupped by the Los Angeles Dodgers in a Fall Classic in which talent only went so far. And besides, the whole package is one that makes you want to check the expiration date.

Judge will be 33 years old in 2025. Gerrit Cole is already 34, and coming off a season in which his elbow threatened his status as an ace. The Yankees have just two prospects in B/R's top 100, one of whom (Spencer Jones) is coming off a brutal year.

Further up the ladder, Brian Cashman has been the Yankees' general manager for too long already, and his current contract runs through 2026. Aaron Boone, who has a permanent residence on the manager hot seat, is only signed through 2025.

The Mets' most recent World Series title is nearly 40 years old, but they have gotten close to getting off the schneid since Cohen bought the franchise in 2020. They won 101 games in 2022 and, after a slow start, arose as the winning-est team in MLB after June 12 of this year.

Soto, who finished third in the AL MVP voting, joins Francisco Lindor, who finished second on the NL side, to form a duo of in-their-prime superstars. Brandon Nimmo is still kicking, and Mark Vientos and Francisco Alvarez are sluggers on the rise.

Manager Carlos Mendoza and president of baseball operations David Stearns have been with the Mets for just one year. Yet both have made their respective marks, and Stearns has barely gotten started on his directive to turn the Mets into the Dodgers of the East Coast.

Ingenuity is only one of two necessary ingredients; the other is a steady flow of cash.

Steve Cohen Gets It. Hal Steinbrenner Does Not.

Does anyone remember that old VISA commercial with George Steinbrenner and Joe Torre?

If not, here it is:

Funny stuff, but also notable for presenting the most honest depiction of MLB ownership ever put to any kind of medium. At the end of the day, all owners have just one critical function: to sign the dang checks.

Cohen understands this. He's spent $1.7 billion on free agents over the last five winters. Add Lindor's 10-year, $341 million extension, and that's over $2 billion in commitments to new Mets.

As of 2022, all this willy-nilly spending puts the Mets at an annual risk of crossing the third luxury-tax threshold, for which the penalties are severe. It's colloquially known as the "Cohen tax" because it is meant to spook a party of one.

And he doesn't care.

Now, contrast all this with how the Yankees operate under Hal Steinbrenner.

It's not that they don't spend. The club's Opening Day payrolls for the last three seasons have pushed closer and closer to $300 million. If Soto had accepted their $760 million offer, they might have reached that mark in 2025.

Yet Hal Steinbrenner finds no joy in spending. He has indeed publicly lamented having to do so, including as recently as May.

"What I always say to you guys like a broken record: I don't believe I should have to have a $300 million payroll to win a championship," Steinbrenner said.

It's too bad for Hal that spending and winning tend to be strongly linked. And so it went in 2024. The three highest-spending teams in MLB were the Mets, Dodgers and Yankees, and all three made it to the Championship Series round of the playoffs.

Perhaps not spending enough doomed the Yankees. Given this is the most valuable and revenue-rich franchise in MLB, their owner lacks excuses.

All Soto and the Mets Have to Do Now Is Win

Lamentation is the name of the game for Yankees fans today. And save for the jersey-burning nimrods among it, one does feel for the base.

There is ample time left in the offseason for the Yankees to save face. There should also be ample money. Though $760 million would only have bought one Juan Soto, it can buy a veritable handful of other free agents.

But, alas, the Yankees' options have already dwindled.

While they were pursuing Soto, backup targets such as Willy Adames and Blake Snell signed elsewhere. Corbin Burnes, Max Fried, Alex Bregman and Pete Alonso are still out there, but any mix of post-Soto desperation and agents' desire to cash in on it has the potential to result in a contract or two that the Yankees could come to regret.

As for you, Mets fans...well, are you having fun yet?

To be sure, even a $765 million signing does not make a complete team. Without Alonso, the Mets need a corner infielder. Bullpen upgrades are also needed, and Holmes and Frankie Montas don't quite fill the voids left by Sean Manaea and Luis Severino in the rotation.

It's a good thing, then, that the Mets are still about $50 million in average annual value short of triggering the Cohen tax for 2025. And even as is, this is a legit World Series contender.

And whereas you can look just two feet in front of the Yankees and spot a cliff's edge, the land before the Mets looks like a welcoming, endless pasture bathed in light.

31-year-old Lindor will age out of his prime before too long, but Soto is a rock like few free-agent signings before him have ever been a rock. Both his peers in that group (i.e., Alex Rodriguez, Bryce Harper and Manny Machado) and his historical comps (i.e., Ted Williams, Jimmie Foxx, Mickey Mantle, etc.) hint at a long, fruitful reign for him as the Mets' core superstar.

Otherwise, Cohen's dollars are not going anywhere. Before he came to Queens, Stearns was known for building a W machine in Milwaukee on a much smaller budget.

Oh, sure. The baseball gods have ways of checking those who would dare be the Icarus to their Daedalus. Just because the Mets have made such an aggressive play for World Series glory does not guarantee they will get it.

But if ever there was a time for Mets fans to get greedy, it is now. The wind is blowing firmly at their backs, which has already proven too powerful for the Yankees.

Don't ask when Soto and the Mets will finally bring home a championship. Ask how soon the next one after that will come.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.