Are the Mets cooked? Latest Juan Soto connection is a sign of desperation, nothing more

The Juan Soto sweepstakes may be in the endgame now. With the Winter Meetings set to begin this week and a longstanding rumor suggesting that the 26-year-old superstar could sign before then, things are shaping up on that timeline. And in Queens, the New York Mets are still holding out all the hope that Steve Cohen and David Stearns can bring home the offseason's biggest prize.

By all accounts, the Mets are absolutely still in the running — but so too are the New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox, Toronto Blue Jays, and Los Angeles Dodgers, according to reports. What's more, Cohen's biggest superpower, his deep pockets, is starting to look less important with reports that every team in the bidding war except for the Dodgers has upped their offer to $700 million or more.

Even still, the Mets remain an attractive landing spot. But as fans of these five teams and of baseball at large continue to await an answer as to where Soto will sign, things can start to spiral out of control in terms of what fans will convince themselves of. Mets fans might be among the worst offenders in that capacity thanks to manager Carlos Mendoza's son.

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Mets manager Carlos Mendoza's son sends fans into desperate frenzy over Juan Soto

The drama started on TikTok and a post about Soto. One of the top comments read "Soto to the sox????". While other users speculated about the possibility of him coming to Boston, Mendoza's son, Adrian, then joined the conversation.

He started by apparently leaking the Mets' offer to Soto, or at least so it seems, saying, "Mets offer him 700 [million] over 15 so no". When there was pushback, he asked, "Bro do you know who [I am]". After more doubters questioned him, he left the conversation behind by saying, "Alright just watch and see [if] you don't believe me".

Now, let's be clear about this: Mendoza's son talking about this so freely isn't nothing. There is a legitimate chance that he does have some information about the Mets negotiating with Soto. At the same time, though, it's probably also not a coincidence that Adrian soon after deleted his TikTok account.

More importantly, though, the reaction of Mets fans to this was akin to thinking that they can go ahead and buy a Soto jersey and wear it around Queens. And regardless of where your fandom lies, that's just peak desperation.

If you dive into any fanbase and their fringe reasons for believing that Juan Soto is coming, you'll find things just like this. Red Sox fans have seen questionable sources confirm that Soto is coming to Boston. Yankees and Blue Jays fans have seen the same. Free agency, especially regarding a player of this magnitude, brings all kinds of "reporters" out of the woodwork.

Ultimately, it comes down to how heartily you believe in those questionable sources of information. Mets fans believing their manager's son has all of the info about Soto coming to Queens is just a touch too desperate, though. Dial it back, take a deep breath, and just take the rollercoaster for as long as it's running — which shouldn't be too much longer.