From the New York Times’ Jack Curry in Tuesday morning’s edition :
Carlos Beltran called Carlos Delgado on Sunday, hours after Beltran agreed in principle to a seven-year, $119 million contract with the Mets. Now the Mets will try to reach out to Delgado when they visit Puerto Rico with Beltran later this week. David Sloane, Delgado’s agent, said the meeting was still being worked out.
ould be able to sign either Beltran or Delgado as a free agent, not both. But the fact that the Mets are poised to meet with Delgado indicates that they are still hoping they can add another high-priced free agent to join Beltran and Pedro MartÃnez.
Beltran, a center fielder who is also a recruiter and who already sounds like a giddy Mets fan, is hoping that his call to Delgado will help bring his friend to New York.
“It would be seriously tremendous if we sign Carlos, too,” Beltran was quoted as saying in the Puerto Rican newspaper El Nuevo Dia on Monday. “I would love it if that could be achieved because we are good friends, but I know he has to make the best decision for him.”
An executive from one of the teams that is courting Delgado said the Mets had told Sloane that they needed to be financially creative to be able to sign Delgado. The executive guessed that the Mets were trying to unload Cliff Floyd, who has two years and $13 million left on his contract, and use the savings in the pursuit of Delgado.
But it is unlikely that the Mets will be able to trade Floyd unless they absorb some of his salary or trade him for a high-salaried player, which is what they were considering in discussions with the Cubs about Sammy Sosa. Those options would not do much to ease the financial weight of adding Delgado.