Adam Eaton wasn’t surprised about the news of his former Washington Nationals teammate Juan Soto and his 15-year $765 million contract with the New York Mets.
“He (Soto) put in the work mentally and physically, and you have some unbelievable attributes to start, so I’m not surprised,” Eaton said.
He expected greatness from Soto ever since he got to know the young Dominican player after being called up to the major league club from Double-A Harrisburg in May 2018.
Well, maybe he didn’t expect the $765 million. No one likely did, save for Soto’s agent, Scott Boras. He saw it coming.
It was what Eaton didn’t see from the talented young player that impressed him the most – ego, the lack of it.
“He came in and was willing to learn,” said Eaton, who retired after 10 major league seasons in 2021 and is currently the director of player development at Michigan State University. “He had no ego and would do anything to get better at baseball. He would ask anybody, me or Harp (Phillies outfielder Bryce Harper) or really anybody of any stature. He just wanted to get better every day.
“The biggest thing for a young player is when you get to the big leagues to learn from everybody else and learn quickly,” Eaton said. “He would always as the right questions and had no ego and I think that maturity helped him be where he is.”
Where he is now is the highest-paid athlete in sports, with a contract nearly double what the Lerner family paid for the Nationals in 2006
Where he is now is the biggest star on the biggest stage in baseball.
It was his bat – 41 home runs,109 RBIs with the American League champion New York Yankees, with a batting title and five Silver Slugger awards on his resume – that got Mets owner Steve Cohen to pull out his checkbook.
But you can’t separate the greatness of Soto the player from Soto the person. He is among the greatest players in baseball and one of the greatest hitters of all time in large part because of the remarkable maturity and composure he has displayed at every turn.
“There were a few things he needed to change within the room, nothing major, and he would listen right away and not have any ego whatsoever,” Eaton said. “He would make adjustments instantly. He probably has taken something from the 60, 70 or 80 guys he has played with over the years and continued to chisel his game. It was his professionalism, his lack of ego.”
Nobody knew that better than the Nationals, who signed Soto as an international free agent from the Dominican Republic in 2015 and watched him grow quickly – maybe except for Boras, the super-agent who truly seems to run baseball. After all, here we are for the beginning of Major League Baseball’s annual offseason show, the winter meetings in Dallas, and it was Boras who dominated the headlines.
This is why the Nationals were never going to sign Soto to a long-term contract when he was here. They offered him a 15-year, $440 million deal in 2022, but they could have offered him $500 million or more and Boras wouldn’t have let Soto take it. He knew that whatever Soto signed for in 2022 would be chump change in 2024 because he knew unless Soto was hurt, he would only continue to be among the best hitters in the game, and, at the age of 26, a very rare free agent for such a young age with such an impressive track record.
Nothing was stopping Boras from taking Soto to free agency except Soto, and the player has publicly professed his faith in his agent numerous times. It’s why Washington traded Soto to the San Diego Padres in 2022 for a group of young, talented players – James Wood, MacKenzie Gore, CJ Abrams, Robert Hassell III and others.
Soto can opt out of his 15-year Mets contract after five years, which really makes it a five-year deal, because, again, five years from now there will likely be bigger contracts with more money, and if Soto doesn’t opt-out, it will likely only be because something has gone wrong.
Maybe Washington, with perhaps new owners by then, can bid on the former National star then. Meantime, you can watch Soto and the Nationals’ other departed future Hall of Famer, Bryce Harper, now with the Phillies, come to Nats Park 14 times a season.
⦁ Catch Thom Loverro on The Kevin Sheehan Show podcast.
• Thom Loverro can be reached at tloverro@washingtontimes.com.
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