The Mets enter the winter with one glaring question hanging over their lineup: who handles first base after the club came up empty trying to replace Pete Alonso’s production in 2026?
President of baseball operations David Stearns left the door open last month when he said, during his post-mortem press conference, that outside help is on the table. That opens up a few different paths, but not all of them come without real risk.
Teruaki Sato is one possibility. The Hanshin Tigers slugger is set up to be the top international player available, and he’s coming off a monster year in Nippon Professional Baseball, where he won the Central League Triple Crown with a .306 average, 39 homers and 106 RBI. Jake Bauers is another name to watch after a breakout season with the Brewers, when he hit 26 home runs, posted strong quality-of-contact and plate-discipline numbers, and even added postseason shine by winning NLCS MVP during Milwaukee’s World Series run.
But both players come with a major question mark: defense.
Sato has been a third baseman and has also spent time in the outfield, which means asking him to learn first base on the fly would be another gamble. The Mets already tried something similar with Jorge Polanco last spring, and injuries quickly wrecked that plan.
Bauers is no safer on that side of the ball; he led all first basemen in errors this season, and his defensive metrics are a clear warning sign. For a team trying to stabilize that spot, another glove liability would be a hard sell.
That’s why Ty France stands out.
France is also available in free agency, and his defensive work in San Diego this season makes a much stronger case. He led all qualified first basemen in defensive runs saved with 15 and finished second in outs above average with 7, a strong indicator of just how much ground he covers. After winning a Gold Glove in the American League last season, he’s back in the mix for another one this year in the National League.
His glove isn’t the only draw. France put together the best offensive season of his career in 2026, hitting .295/.363/.502 with 21 home runs and 72 RBI across 133 games. His .865 OPS and 141 wRC+ both topped anything he’d done in his eight-year career.
There are still some concerns. His strikeout rate climbed, he can chase and miss too often, and he walked just 7.4% of the time.
He’s also not far removed from a rough stretch that included being designated for assignment by the Mariners two years ago. Before landing in San Diego on a minor-league deal with a spring training invite this past winter, his career had been in a very different place.
Even so, France has shown enough big-league track record to make the 2026 version believable. He was an All-Star with Seattle in 2022, and from 2020 to 2023 he hit .274 with a .768 OPS in more than 2,000 plate appearances. That matters when weighing him against Bauers, who was a .211 hitter with a .672 OPS for his career before this season, and Sato, who would be making the jump to MLB for the first time.
For the Mets, France checks a lot of boxes. He’d shore up one of their biggest weaknesses, and he’d also give them lineup flexibility.
If manager Andy Green chooses to play him every day, Jared Young could slide back into a utility role and continue providing pinch-hit value and spot starts. If New York prefers to platoon, France’s history against left-handed pitching makes him a logical half of that arrangement.
The market will be crowded, and France should have plenty of suitors. The Mets also have to decide how many years they’re willing to commit, which is where the risk starts to creep in.
That kind of contract becomes more dangerous fast, as the Polanco deal showed last offseason. But if New York is serious about fixing first base, another veteran miss is the one outcome it cannot afford.
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Now comes the part the Mets always have to navigate this time of year, when marginal additions can turn into real decisions. Cairo, Weston and Abner all sit in that gray area where recent performance and organizational need will shape what comes next, but the bigger question is how much room New York is willing to keep open for players it only just brought in and has not yet seen on the field. [Read more 🡒]
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For the Mets, the appeal is obvious. Steve Cohen has shown a willingness to chase elite talent, and a pitcher of Skubals caliber would fit the kind of aggressive offseason the club has rarely been shy about considering. The wrinkle is the broader market, where a possible MLB lockout could affect how freely teams spend and how they approach long-term commitments, leaving the Mets to navigate both a bidding war and an uncertain winter. [Read more 🡒]