With Yankees proprietor Hal Steinbrenner set to fulfill with free agent Juan Soto and Scott Boras on the agent’s Southern California headquarters subsequent week, Aaron Boone plans on becoming a member of the assembly.
The precise date of the go to is unknown, however the Yankees will go to Soto after the Mets and their proprietor, Steve Cohen, achieve this this week. Final week, on the GM Conferences, Boras mentioned that Soto desires to fulfill with house owners in order that he can hear their plans for constant rivalry, an expectation the slugger has for any group he indicators with.
In fact, Soto can be anticipating appreciable monetary gives, because the 26-year-old is predicted to command at the very least half-a-billion {dollars} after one of many higher seasons of his profession helped the Yankees attain the World Collection in 2024.
“His focus always was, ‘I want to know who my owner is, I want to know that we’re going to be able to win, and I want to know that besides me, there’s going to be a great number of support on the part of the owner that he has the same desire to win that I do,’” Boras mentioned, per SNY. “’I’m going to commit my career to it, and I want the owner to commit his resources to it.’”
Boras added that Soto is predicted to undergo a “thorough process.” The agent additionally mentioned that Soto was “really comfortable” in New York this previous season, however the participant beforehand declared himself out there to “all 30 teams.”
Soto additionally declined to publicly promise the Yankees the possibility to match any closing gives.
“The Yankees have open arms to come in and talk to me,” Soto mentioned. “I don’t have any doors closed. I’m going to keep all of my doors open, and whoever wants to come in and talk, we can have a conversation.”
Boone, making ready to be a part of that dialog, mentioned he’s not going into the assembly with a selected gross sales pitch.
As a substitute, the supervisor, who simply had a 2025 membership choice picked up, will lean on the connection he constructed with Soto this previous season.
“I do know him,” Boone, who performed an energetic half in Aaron Choose’s free company just a few offseasons in the past, mentioned over Zoom on Monday. “Let it be organic and let the meeting go where it needs to go. I’m sure maybe he’ll have questions now that he is a free agent or want to address certain things. I’m just going to go in there and be myself and confident in my relationship with Juan and the ability to have honest conversations with him and certainly, hopefully cement the point of how valuable and how much we think of him, not only as a player, but as a person. I got to live that with him this year. That would be my sales pitch. Of course, how much we want him, but let the meeting go where it goes.”
Boone added that will probably be a “fairly small meeting,” although he isn’t positive who else will attend simply but.
Boone is hoping that whoever is within the room can persuade Soto to spend his foreseeable future within the Bronx. Nonetheless, it’s unlikely that Soto’s free company ends with the Yankees’ assembly.
Along with the Mets, Soto could have loads of curiosity from baseball’s greatest spenders and annual contenders. Groups together with, however not restricted to, the Blue Jays, Dodgers, Phillies, Pink Sox and Nationals, Soto’s unique group, have all been linked to the famous person.
With that in thoughts, Boone isn’t being shy about how a lot he’d like Soto to remain.
“What Juan did for us between the lines this year was pretty special,” Boone mentioned. “He put together a remarkable season. But equally, I was just impressed with the person and really getting to know him, and getting to manage him was a pleasure. So I will be there next week. I certainly would love to have him back, obviously. I want him in pinstripes moving forward, but you also know there’s going to be a lot of people competing for that, and who knows where it ends up?
“All I know is that we’ll try and put our best foot forward with it and hope that Juan’s back, but also know that whatever happens, I’m confident that the Steinbrenner family and the front office are going to do everything possible to put us in a position to have another strong team, another team that has a chance to compete for a championship. They’ve done that long before I got here and I know that will continue to be the case. Hopefully it’s with Juan, but we’ll see how it all plays out.”
