It turns out Juan Soto ditching Yankees for Mets was a dream for Dodgers

The Los Angeles Dodgers bowed out of the Juan Soto chase relatively early on last winter. Sure, they made a $600 million offer, which is nothing to sneeze at and was around what the generational talent was projected to get when hot stove season opened, but ultimately they were content to let the New York Yankees and New York Mets fight it out amongst each other.

That appears to have been the correct call. The Yankees didn't have one specific move in mind to replace Soto, and instead pivoted to signing Max Fried and trading for Cody Bellinger (among other odds and ends) in an attempt to create a deeper team overall than the one that reached the 2024 World Series with Soto in tow.

The Mets, of course, came away with the prize, and while they made other splashy-sounding moves, deals with Sean Manaea and Pete Alonso were simply retaining players that had already been part of the team that fell to the Dodgers in the 2024 NLCS.

With all of that in the rearview, we can see that the Dodgers played their hand perfectly, while the Yankees and Mets both made fatal missteps.

Dodgers are proving that Yankees and Mets both mishandled the Juan Soto situation

The Yankees' attempt to spread the Soto money around to build a deeper roster fell short largely because of their own stubbornness and miscalculations. In trading for Devin Williams, they did not put the same care into personality type and culture fit that Andrew Friedman and the Dodgers so carefully consider with their acquisitions.

Worse yet, they stopped short of achieving their actual goal of creating a more well-rounded roster by letting artificial financial constraints leave third base vacant, instead relying on a clown car of mediocrity. Oswald Peraza, Pablo Reyes, and DJ LeMahieu factored into the equation at the hot corner. That led to the panic trade at the deadline for another flawed option in Ryan McMahon.

The Mets, on the other hand, became top-heavy. Once the injury bug struck the starting rotation in Queens, and the reclamation projects that worked so well for them in 2024 reverted to their pre-Mets form, they struggled and ultimately sat out the postseason. Their shiny new toy was wasted.

The Dodgers weren't without fault. Moves like Tanner Scott, Kirby Yates, and Michael Conforto blew up in their faces, yet they had the type of roster that was deep enough to persevere.

Fast forward to today, and you can see how the Dodgers' focus on finding not only the best players but the right ones for their team, market, and vision — as well as their follow-through to build a complete roster — has benefitted them. Two deep playoff runs resulting in rings the past two seasons have also added a considerable amount of revenue to their coffers.

With that, they've been able to make big, surgical strikes this offseason. First was stealing away Edwin Diaz from the Mets, who will be replaced by Williams after his flameout in the Bronx, amid reports that the former Milwaukee Brewer didn't really want to sign there but went for the money. Little brother didn't learn from big bro's mistake, apparently.

The second was swooping in and stealing away Kyle Tucker while Steve Cohen was busy looking for smoke. The Mets did pivot to sign Bo Bichette, but their infield was already crowded, and the move reeks of panic.

The Yankees, meanwhile, have puttered around at the margins. They still haven't learned their lesson. They're worse without Soto if they don't make several big swings to replace him in the aggregate. You can like Ryan Yarbrough, Amed Rosario, and Ryan Weathers, but those bottom-of-the-roster plays are nothing in comparison to bringing in talents like Diaz, Tucker, and Roki Sasaki over the last two offseasons.

Not signing Soto may have been the best thing that ever happened to the Dodgers. In that aftermath, they've watched their two biggest rivals in terms of market size run around lost, not understanding how to truly supplement the loss (in the Yankees' case) or how to build around Soto.

The Dodgers will enter spring training as the odds-on World Series favorites, while the Yankees and Mets might not even be favored to win their own divisions.