Sandy Alderson Up to Old Tricks on Mets Payroll

Sandy Alderson is up to his old tricks, bending the truth to suit his needs when it comes to discussing the Mets payroll.

According to a report Tuesday from ESPN New York, Alderson is using the figure of $87 million as the final number for the 2013 payroll. This is significant because Alderson is using it to determine the 2014 Mets payroll.

“I don’t think our payroll will be below what we saw last year,” Alderson said. “As far as where it will finally land, let’s defer that question until all precincts have reported.”

So basically Alderson is saying the payroll will be at least $87 million in 2014, and probably not much more than that. So the Mets will be able to say that the payroll did not go down.

But I have no idea where Alderson is getting that $87 million figure. Cots Baseball Contracts, the bible of such things, puts the Mets payroll in 2013 at $93,368,490. ESPN uses a $95 million figure. Obviously Alderson knows the Mets finances better than any web entity, but his numbers just don’t add up.

Then there is question of the $8.5 million in 2014 buyouts owed to Johan Santana and Jason Bay. Mets Blog seems to think that was included in the 2013 figures, but that appears to be impossible. I wonder if Alderson will include them in the 2014 numbers so he can spend even less on new players.

The bottom line is that the Mets payroll continues to go down, and no one in the Mets organization will cop to a fact that is apparent to everyone who doesn’t work at Citi Field. I’ve said it before and I will say it again — it is becoming harder and harder to stay loyal to a team which treats its fans like this.