Steve Cohen appears to win over Mets fans by blasting Pete Alonso's camp

Steve Cohen can afford to pay Pete Alonso whatever he wants. The man ranked No. 162 on Bloomberg's Billionaires index has already committed to paying Juan Soto $765 million over the next 15 years, the largest contract in the history of professional sports. What's half of that — a quarter, even — to a man worth $14.8 billion?

Nonetheless, negotiations with the free agent first baseman have been dragging. It's odd that Alonso, who's hit 226 homers for the Mets since his blistering 2019 Rookie of the Year campaign, is still a free agent at all.

But the market rate for 30-year-old first basemen with one-dimensional offensive profiles — even if that one dimension is pretty darn impressive — is poor. The Mets reportedly offered Alonso a three-year contract in the $68-70 million range. That was likely the approximate value of the offer owner Steve Cohen was referring to Saturday, when he confirmed at a fan event that the Mets made Alonso a "significant" offer.

SNY posted video of Cohen's comments at "Amazin' Day" to its Twitter/X feed. Pay attention how the crowd shifts from chants of "We Want Pete!" to patient listening, to polite applause after hearing the Mets' owner blast Alonso's camp for what he called "exhausting" negotiations:

"I don't like the negotiations," Cohen told the fans. "I don't like what's being presented to us. Maybe that changes. Certainly I'll always stay flexible. If it stays this way, I think we're going to have to get used to the fact that we're going to have to go forward with the existing players."

It's almost as if the $765 million investment in Soto bought Cohen the benefit of the doubt.

"He's entitled to go out and explore his market," Cohen said. "Personally this has been an exhausting conversation and negotiation. Soto was tough. This is worse."

Soto and Alonso are both represented by agent Scott Boras. Is Boras getting greedy? Is Cohen wary about being perceived as caving to fan pressure?

For every fan who complains about every gripe in a battle between millionaires and billionaires, there's a few thousand more who enjoy the theater when the gripe goes public. If Alonso leaves, the most convincing argument for Mets fans that their team is OK without him would be a World Series title.

MORE TOP STORIES from The Big Lead
NFL: Conference championship: previews…
NFL: …and TV announcers
CFB: Ranking next season’s top QBs
NBA/SPORTS MEDIA: Shaq and Chuck argue about Jimmy Butler