Mets owner hints at possible payroll limit

Sep 11, 2021; New York City, New York, USA; New York Mets majority owner Steve Cohen and his wife Alexandra Cohen at Citi Field. Mandatory Credit: Wendell Cruz-USA TODAY Sports

The New York Mets under owner Steve Cohen have been one of the biggest spenders in baseball. There may, however, be a limit to how far Cohen is willing to go to spend on a winner.

In an appearance on the New York Post’s “The Show” podcast, Cohen hinted to Jon Heyman and Joel Sherman that $300 million might be the upper limit to how far he is willing to go in terms of payroll.

“You should be able to build a pretty good team at $300 million,” Cohen said Wednesday, via Zach Braziller of the New York Post. “If you can’t do that, then that’s a problem.”

The Mets entered the 2022 season with a payroll around $265 million, so there is some room to spend. That said, a good portion of that money will probably go into keeping key players who are bound for free agency.

Cohen has joked about spending $300 million before, but this is a serious response he has not really gone into before. Such a payroll would easily be the highest in the sport, and would go way past the 2023 luxury tax threshold of $233 million. As long as the money is fueling a winning team, Cohen seems unlikely to care about any of that.