I think he didn’t do himself any favors this time around. He could’ve had Soto making bank here, incentivizing a timely retooling including his clients and have the other teams bidding up other clients. Now, a previously big spending team in a market that can sustain that might not return that way for who knows how long.
And if there is a return to free agency, it might just be one of the big spending teams using up the big money on him rather than another client. Given the limited number of teams for his clients and the cyclical nature of that, incentivizing his client to make a deal there seems to be more towards his interest rather than risking one sizable market potentially tapping out for quite a while.
