The agents for Mets LF Yoenis Cespedes used exposure data in his contract negotiations to "calculate Cespedes's overall dollar value" to the team, according to James Wagner of the N.Y. TIMES. CAA Baseball co-Head Brodie Van Wagenen and Roc Nation Baseball Managing Dir Kyle Thousand, who together represent Cespedes, met with Mets officials in October and "came up with a dollar figure for the impact Cespedes had on the field, social media, team television revenues, and ticket and merchandise sales." With the help of an outside analytics firm, they even "put a figure" -- $3.2M -- on the "value of the approximately 50 tabloid back pages that had featured Cespedes" over the course of '16. Van Wagenen and Thousand's conclusion was that Cespedes was worth $34.7M to the Mets in '16, or $7.1M "more than the team had paid him." The message "was clear" -- that the Mets "could afford" an expensive multiyear deal for Cespedes. The team would "make it back, and more." The Mets and Cespedes ultimately agreed on a four-year, $110M deal. Mets GM Sandy Alderson said that he was "intrigued by their presentation." He said, "The general concept that some players are worth a little more than just the sum of their plate appearances is valid. It has to be taken into account." Van Wagenen said he wanted to give teams "a different way to look at players." He added that Cespedes "was the first player for whom they had tried the approach" (N.Y. TIMES, 1/5).
