Top Landing Spots For Free Agent Pete Alonso

For the second year in a row, Pete Alonso finds himself entering the free agent market. However, he is doing so after a much better campaign in 2025 than his first crack at a walk-year in 2024.

Alonso’s 2025 season got off to a roaring start, as he was the NL Player of the Month in April after hitting .343/.474/.657, with a 213 wRC+. He hit 11 doubles and seven home runs, drove in 28 runs, and walked more than he struck out.

While Alonso would not maintain that MVP-like performance for the remainder of the season, he did have a strong year, posting his best OPS (.871) since his 2019 Rookie of the Year campaign.

Take a trip to Pete Alonso’s Baseball Savant page and you will be met by a sea of red.

The Mets first baseman ranked in the 96th percentile or better in HardHit%, Barrel%, Average Exit Velocity, xSLG and xwOBA.

Comparing his 2024 season to 2025, Alonso raised his average exit velocity from 89.8 MPH to 93.5 MPH. His HardHit rate spiked 8% from 46.4% to 54.4%.

Gaining nearly four MPH in average EV is a massive shift for Alonso and bodes well for his free agency. His quality of contact was much-improved, which led to a career-high batting average, a spike in doubles, making the Mets slugger a much more complete hitter.

While Alonso re-enters the market a year older, he finds himself in a much better position than where he was a year ago. Sure, Alonso had a great postseason prior to free agency, hitting an iconic series-winning home run, leading his team to Game 6 of the NLCS.

Still, teams are going to value that sample size of a full season where Alonso was back to looking like one of the most dangerous sluggers in baseball.

Instead of being on what looked like a bit of a decline in 2024, hitting a career-low 34 home runs and 88 RBIs, Alonso is coming off a season one of the best seasons of his career, pointing towards an upward trajectory that keeps him squarely in his prime.

Free Agent Profile: Pete Alonso

• Age in 2026: 31
• 2025 Stats: 162 G, .272/.347/.524, 38 HR, 126 RBI, 141 wRC+, 3.6 fWAR
• 2025 Salary: $30 million, $24 million player option in 2026
• Qualifying Offer Eligible: No, declined the QO for 2025

Contract Projection

• Contract Length Expectation: 3-6 years
• Expected AAV: $25-35 million

Years were hard to come by in Alonso’s last tour through the open market, as he ultimately landed back with the Mets on a two-year, $54 million deal, with the second year being a player option.

This was a pillow contract for Alonso, who cashed in and can now test his market again after a much better season. Alonso has spoken about wanting to play until he is 40, and with 264 career home runs, a long-term deal allows him to chase some prodigious career milestones.

With all of that said, teams have not valued first basemen in the market in recent years and have particularly been hesitant to commit to right-handed sluggers on long-term deals.

If Alonso expects to sign a deal that takes him until his 40s, he is out of luck. However, getting a five-year deal should be attainable to cover the first half of his 30s.

When looking at the contract parameters we have defined above, there is a great variance in terms of what Alonso could make on his next deal. If Alonso gets a longer term deal, we could see the AAV of that contract drop closer to $25 million than the $30 million he made in 2025.

However, if Alonso fails to get the long-term deal he seeks, there is every chance he could once again end up signing a short-term high-AAV deal, where Alonso could get a raise to make $35 million per season.

Free Agent Landing Spots for Pete Alonso

New York Mets

It is pretty hard to imagine Pete Alonso wearing anything but a Mets uniform. He just became the franchise’s all-time leader in home runs, and it would be a shame for him to leave without setting a very high mark for teammate Juan Soto to chase over his 15-year deal.

Alonso has made his desire to return to New York very clear, and Mets fans and players alike clearly want to see Pete back. The only question is how the powers at be approach these negotiations.

Last year, it was not until February that Alonso signed his deal, as Mets President of Baseball Ops David Stearns played a long game of chicken with his agent, Scott Boras.

Stearns, Boras, Mets owner Steve Cohen and Alonso finally got in the same room weeks before spring training, and they were able to come to terms on that two-year, $54 million deal.

Whether it was because of having the qualifying offer attached, or because everyone knew he wasn’t going to leave when he had the Mets all-time home run record in sight, Alonso’s market never materialized enough for him to land a long-term deal.

Now the question is if another team enters the market for Alonso, giving him the bidding war required to push the Mets to a place where they may get a bit uncomfortable.

Boston Red Sox

Last year, the expectation was that Triston Casas would be the Boston Red Sox’s starting first baseman, but for the second year in a row, Casas was unable to stay on the field due to injuries.

Luckily for Boston, the Washington Nationals DFA’d Nathaniel Lowe in August, and the Red Sox swooped him up, signing the 30-year-old and giving him the keys to first base down the stretch. Lowe played well, hitting .280/.370/.420, with a 114 wRC+.

Since Lowe is still short of six years of service time, the Red Sox can keep him on their roster through arbitration. Or they can non-tender him and keep their options open in free agency.

Lowe has a career 117 wRC+, and has played at least 140 games in each of the past five seasons. Boston could keep Lowe as a high-floor option to start at first base, then hope that Casas can stay healthy and maybe raise their ceiling.

OR, they can throw caution to the wind, non-tender Lowe, trade Casas, and sign Pete Alonso to be the 40-HR masher this lineup desperately needs. It is more likely they re-sign Alex Bregman and stay internal at first base, but you never know what could happen in free agency.

Washington Nationals

If James Wood is supposed to become Juan Soto-lite in D.C., why not steal Soto’s protection?