“When you look at what we gave up, clearly we were all in. It just was one of those acquisitions that you don’t necessarily expect to happen. When I left the GM meetings, I got the sense of, ‘We’re going to do it or we’re not.’ So as we were actually getting close to the winter meetings, I was scared that it wasn’t.”

Chairman Bill DeWitt credited the scouting and player development departments for creating the young talent surplus that it took to land Ozuna in 2017 and now Goldschmidt.

“That’s going to remain our staple,” said Mozeliak. “We’re going to continue to invest in that and do well with that, but this was a deal that presented itself that seemed like it was almost like a unicorn. We chased it. And we got it.”

Goldschmidt, 31, made many points with the fan base Friday when he said, “I don’t know of a player in baseball who doesn’t want to play here. There’s certain organizations that are just known for greatness and this is one of them.”