Late Saturday night, the New York Mets officially signed Japanese pitcher Kodai Senga to a five-year contract that will pay the right-hander $75 million.
Senga comes to New York as one of the off-season’s highly touted pitchers, whose fastball has topped 100 mph in Japan. The soon-to-be 30-year-old Senga, started 11 seasons with the Fukuoka Softbank Hawks in the Nippon Professional Baseball League. He holds a lifetime 104-51 record with a 2.42 ERA in 1,304.2 innings. In addition to his heater, Senga brings a split-finger fastball nicknamed the Ghost Fork. Yikes!!
The signing of Senga pushes the Mets payroll to heights not seen in Major League Baseball. According to ESPN, the Mets competitive balance tax-payroll will be roughly $345 million. The Mets are also facing steep tax penalties, including a $76.2 million CBT bill, and a total payroll of $421 million.
Clearly, owner Steve Cohen does not care what people think, he just wants to win.
The Mets rotation is now completely transformed with Senga, Justin Verlander and Jose Quintana replacing Jacob deGrom, Chris Bassitt and Taijuan Walker.
The Mets also spent big bucks on retaining Brandon Nimmo in center field, and signed David Robertson to a one-year $10 million deal.
The question of course is, are the Mets done? Probably not.
