Michael Bourn Didn’t Consider Mets Offer
Despite reports that the Mets were really and truly Michael Bourn’s first choice, he said Tuesday that he never seriously considered the Mets offer because it would have required him to wait weeks until the draft pick nonsense was settled.
“I couldn’t do that,” Bourn told Jon Heyman of CBS Sports. “I’d still be sitting at home.”
You can put the blame squarely on Sandy Alderson for this. He wanted to wait until he was really, really close to a deal with Bourn before formally asking the league or the players union or whomever to bend the rule and allow the Mets to keep their 11th pick in the amateur draft. Apparently he thought a positive ruling would have given Michael Bourn’s agent, the evil Scott Boras, more leverage.
Instead, the Mets never asked and Bourn did the right thing and jumped on Cleveland’s offer of four years, $48 million, with an option for a fifth year. The Mets apparently offered the same deal but with no option.
I would be really angry about this if I thought signing Michael Bourn would have been a game-changing move for the Mets. Bourn would have been nice, but not for that much money and that many years. I think that money will eventually be spent on several players who will have the same, if not more, effect on the Mets than Michael Bourn might have had.