When Steve Cohen talked this past week about what it takes for a player to make it in New York, he landed on a truth Mets fans know well: the city can expose people fast.
“I think we do extensive due diligence [on whether they can play here] and we try to get to know the player as well as we can,” he said. “But that’s a hard one, right? . . .
It’s not easy to come to New York, with a big media presence and a lot of eyes on you. It’s not easy to change teams in general, and so you have to expect some adjustment process.
It’s not true with everybody, but we’ve seen it a lot.”
A few months ago, that kind of comment would have had fans hoping Bo Bichette would opt out at the end of the season. Now, the mood should be different.
Bichette seems unlikely to walk away from a guaranteed $42 million after the year he’s had, unless he simply wants out of New York. And that would be a choice, because the season has also shown something else: he can take the noise, absorb the boos and still settle in.
He was hitting .213 on June 2. Then he got four hits on June 3 and went on to slash .316/.353/.479 over his next 67 games.
In that stretch, he hit eight of his 13 homers and drove in 37 of his 65 RBIs. He’s also batting .292 with runners in scoring position, second on the team behind Jared Young, and he’s done it in 106 at-bats, more than double Young’s 52.
That matters because Bichette hasn’t just been producing. He’s been available.
He’s the only player on the roster to appear in all 129 games this season, and he’s handled third, second and shortstop without making an issue of it. In a season full of frustration, he’s still been the guy standing there every day, adjusting to a new place and a harsh one at that.
That’s how a player starts to look like someone who can survive here.
The contrast with Kyle Tucker is hard to miss. Tucker, who the Mets were chasing before they turned to Bichette, has had a miserable year with the Dodgers.
Los Angeles may be a big market, but it gives struggling players more room to breathe than New York does. The crowd is generally easier on its own, the team is coming off back-to-back championships, and there’s plenty of star power around a player to share the attention.
Even so, Tucker has been under the weight of a four-year, $240 million contract and was hitting .186 at home compared to .272 on the road entering Saturday. He was booed loudly after failing to catch a fly ball last Sunday and was seen crying in the dugout.
Then, after all that, Dodgers fans gave him a standing ovation Friday. The whole episode only reinforced how hard it is to climb out of a slump once the pressure turns.
Bichette has already lived through that kind of stretch. He left the only organization he had ever known, moved countries and played every day for a team that has been hard to watch. He heard the questions, took the criticism and got jeered so often that it felt like his first name should have had an extra “o” on the end.
He was part of the problem. He was also part of the answer, even if that answer doesn’t fully arrive until 2027.
Cohen also said the Mets may have hurt themselves by trying to do too much at once. They overhauled the coaching staff and stripped the roster down. There’s still plenty to fix if they want to avoid a repeat next year, but Bichette opting in would at least give them another layer of stability in an offseason that already looks shaky, with a weak free-agent class and a labor fight that could push back the season.
In the end, the decision belongs to Bichette. The money is real, but so are the alternatives.
He already has a $40 million signing bonus, and the Mets would owe him $5 million if he opts out. He could chase a softer landing somewhere else.
Or he could stay, take the guaranteed deal and keep proving he can do what not everyone can do in New York.
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