Verlander reaches 2-year free agent deal with Mets
SAN DIEGO — He arrived as a hired hand amid Hurricane Harvey’s destruction, in the sort of trade deadline deal the Houston Astros almost never executed. With a city in crisis and a ballclub teetering, Justin Verlander agreed to be an Astro on Aug. 31, 2017, lifting spirits in a stricken city while leaving the comforts of the only home he’d ever known.
What began as a bid to win one World Series segued into a prolific five-year partnership. Verlander defied age, reasserted himself as one of this generation’s greatest pitchers and is now forever a face of the Astros’ golden era. Houston won two World Series and played for a third with Verlander atop its rotation.
He signed two more contracts in Houston, collected career milestones and, last season, authored a comeback few could have realistically envisioned. Verlander got married, became a father and, by all accounts, a better teammate during an Astros tenure that can only be described as transformational.
On Monday morning, it came to an end.
Verlander is in agreement with the New York Mets on a two-year contract worth a reported $86 million. The deal contains a vesting option for 2025, too, possibly tying Verlander to the Mets through his age-43 season.
According to multiple reports, the deal will pay Verlander $43.3 million in 2023 and 2024, matching his new teammate Max Scherzer for the highest average annual value in major league history. Scherzer is 38. Verlander turns 40 in February, meaning he must continue the defiance of age he mastered as an Astro.
In four full seasons with Houston, Verlander won two Cy
Young Awards and finished runner-up for another. He threw his third no-hitter, struck out his 3,000th batter and won an ERA title while wearing an Astros uniform. He had a 3.87 ERA in 109
1⁄3 postseason innings. Houston won 11 of the 17 playoff games Verlander started.
Verlander struck out 21 Yankees across 16 innings of one-run ball during the 2017 American League Championship Series. He won MVP honors and pitched his club to its first pennant in 12 years. Houston captured two more during Verlander’s reign and another while
he rehabilitated from Tommy John surgery in 2021.
Verlander returned this season with a reconstructed elbow and a mission to extend his career. He’s long professed a desire
to pitch until he’s 45. According to Mlb.com, only 10 pitchers had Tommy John surgery at 37 or older and returned to pitch in the major leagues. Verlander, at age 39, finished with the lowest ERA of his career in his first season back. He unanimously won the American League Cy Young Award and proved to an entire sport he is nowhere close to finished.
Houston had exclusive negotiating rights with Verlander for five days following the World Series. According to multiple people familiar with his thinking, owner Jim Crane set parameters at around two years and a $35 million average annual value, something similar to the two-year, $66 million contract Crane gave him prior to the 2019 season.
Crane and Verlander formed a close relationship across their five-year partnership, so it never seemed wise to rule out a reunion, but as November progressed and Verlander met with other teams, it became apparent the Astros were falling out of the sweepstakes.
The team still returns six starting pitchers in Verlander’s absence and its needs are more urgent elsewhere. Crane signed first baseman José Abreu to a three-year, $58.5 million contract to bolster his lineup and is still actively seeking a lefthanded-hitting outfielder.
Retaining Verlander would have been a luxury — one the Astros decided they could live without after five years reaping its benefits.