The New York Mets‘ future is depending more on Bo Bichette than they may have anticipated.
When Bichette signed with the Mets last offseason, he had opt-outs built in following each year of his three-year, $126 million contract. New York may have figured Bichette would head right back to free agency after the 2026 season.
But then Bichette had a challenging year, and he couldn’t turn down a $42 million salary for 2027, so he opted-in and will remain with the Mets.
There are worse players to have on a roster than Bichette, but it does complicate things. The Mets have some choices to make for how to improve a roster that didn’t come close to making the playoffs, and those decisions hinge in part on figuring out how to fit Bichette in the picture on his expensive contract.
The Mets already moved Bichette to third base for 2026 to make him fit into their lineup. Depending on what moves the Mets make this offseason, there could be more key determinations to figure out.
Bo Bichette Blocking Teruaki Sato
Bichette isn’t actively doing anything to stop the Mets from making moves, but his presence is problematic.
The Mets are one of the teams that could be after Japanese slugger Teruaki Sato, who is a third baseman. But if Bichette has to play third base, then where does Sato go? His other best spot is right field, which has been occupied by Carson Benge.
New York could go with a domino effect and move Bichette to second base and pay Marcus Semien a lot of money to not play. The Mets could also try to teach Sato first base.
But the presence of Bichette certainly complicates things.
If he had left, the Mets could’ve followed a similar path to the Blue Jays last offseason — they had Bichette depart their lineup and signed a Japanese star, Kazuma Okamoto, essentially to replace him.
$42 Million Future Implications
And the other thing with Bichette is that unless he turns things around in a major way in 2027, he may just opt-in to his $42 million salary for 2028, as well.
The Mets gave him a deal with a high enough annual average value to beat out everyone else pursuing him.
The problem is it doesn’t appear to have worked out in New York’s favor.
All the Mets can do is hope that Bichette turns back into the type of player who gets 200 hits in a season. If he doesn’t do that, everything has been made more complicated by the fact that they pursued Bichette in the first place.
Bo Bichette Blocks Mets’ Logical Next Move