DALLAS — The Mets are leaving the Winter Meetings with only one new player, though that one player, star outfielder Juan Soto, arguably makes them the winners of the week. While they were hoping to land a few others, the market has been more sluggish than expected, especially when it comes to the high-end position players. This makes it tricky to determine what first baseman Pete Alonso is worth. According to sources, a market for the Polar Bear has not yet emerged. However, his agent, Scott Boras, said he is meeting with teams. “Pete Alonso is open to listening to a lot of teams, and has been doing so,” Boras said Wednesday at the Hilton Anatole during his annual press conference. “His experiences with the Mets were extraordinary, both for them and him.” Some in the industry expect him to return to the Mets, but some just aren’t sure how to gauge a fair contract for a 30-year-old right-handed hitting first baseman like Alonso. However, the other position players in Alonso’s tier haven’t signed either and there doesn’t appear to be much movement. That could be changing soon. Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns said there is plenty of talk between agents and teams about that group, even if there has been little movement outside of the Soto deal. “I think there’s ongoing dialog,” Stearns said Wednesday before departing Dallas. “Tough for me to contextualize exactly where it is, but in all segments of the free agent market, top or or lower tiers, I think this was a very active Winter Meetings in terms of discussion. And we probably have a little surprise that throughout the industry, there hasn’t been more actual signings, but I think it was a pretty active discussion meetings.” As for why there hasn’t been a ton of signings, Stearns isn’t exactly sure. “I have no idea,” he said. “I think both sides are always trying to operate with as complete information as possible. From the player side, he wants to know what his complete market is so that he can make the best choice. From the club side, we also want to know what our complete market is and what our choices are. Sometimes that leads to a lot of information gathering and a lot of discussion, and that seems to be where the industry is.” Alonso is a unique case study. A four-time All-Star, the NL Rookie of the Year and the league’s home run leader in 2019, Alonso was a perennial MVP candidate until 2023, when his production dropped off. That was the year he hit only .217, a career-low average, but he still smashed 46 home runs, surpassing the 40-homer threshold for the third time. Last season, he set out to improve his average, and brought it up to .240, but his power numbers were down. Alonso hit only 34 home runs and posted a career-low .788 OPS. Even more concerning, a once-prolific run producer drove in only 88 runs and hit .232 with runners in scoring position. He finished both seasons with an OPS+ of 123 and a wRC+ of 121 and 122. He went from being a 4.7 fWAR player in 2019 to a 2.1 fWAR player in 2024. However, he did play 162 games last season, and has never played fewer than 152 in a full season. He was also an emotional leader for the Mets and a postseason hero. The Mets are aware that Alonso is a fan favorite and a cursory glance at social media shows fans begging the team to bring him back. He’s marketable, active in the community and well-liked by teammates and coaches. But the Mets have to separate their personal feelings about Alonso when looking at the numbers. “We all have emotions. I mean, I have emotion, Steve [Cohen] has emotion, we all have emotions. It’s one of the reasons we’re drawn to this game,” Stearns said. “While making decisions, it’s also my job to try to strip that away a little bit and try to implement processes and systems within our organization that allow us to make the best decisions possible, both near- and long-term.” The Mets know Alonso better than any other team and have their own valuations. Still, it’s fair for them to want to find out how other teams value him and other free agent first basemen like Christian Walker. While yes, they might need more lineup protection for Soto, it’s possible that it comes from somewhere else. The waiting game does little to comfort fans, but sometimes it’s necessary. “I think we’ve made ourselves better,” Stearns said. “We have been in play in a number of different situations, we talked about starting pitching being a priority, and we’ve been able to add multiple starters already and are still engaged in starting pitching. I think, clearly, we’re working hard to add to our position player group as well.”