The white smoke hasn’t been released in Kyle Tucker’s free agency yet.
But that didn’t stop Steve Cohen from waiting to set social media on fire.
The Mets owner took to X on Thursday evening, and while he didn’t mention the All-Star outfielder by name, appeared to hint about it with a cryptic post.
“Let me know when you see smoke,” Cohen said, referring to the papal conclave where white smoke is sent out of a chimney in St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City when a new pope is chosen to lead the Catholic Church and black smoke when a vote does not pick the new pontiff.
Cohen followed up shortly after with another post, confirming he was making a joke and had no insider knowledge about Tucker’s thought process.
“For those who don’t understand the pope election reference,” he wrote, “we are waiting for a decision. That’s all I know.”
Tucker, long considered the best bat in this free agent class, has three suitors in play for his services — the Blue Jays, Mets and Dodgers.
The Amazin’s, in their efforts to vie for his services, have offered Tucker a $50 million-per-season contract over four seasons, noti.group’s Mike Puma reported Thursday.
Toronto, on the other hand, has reportedly offered Tucker a longer deal, with ESPN’s Jeff Passan saying during a Sportsnet hit on Wednesday night that the Blue Jays could “potentially” go up to 10 years.
As with many top free agents, the Dodgers have remained lurking in case they see an opportunity to swoop in.
Tucker, in his lone season with the Cubs in 2025, made the National League All-Star team and hit 22 homers with an .841 OPS over 136 games.
Over his first seven seasons with the Astros, he posted a .274/.353/.516 slash line with 125 long balls.
He’s been a Statcast darling throughout his playing career and ranked in the 98th percentile in chase rate and 96th in walk rate this past season. Impressively, his walk (87) and strikeout (88) totals were nearly identical.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
