Before the Mets began their search for a new general manager after the 2021 season, team president Sandy Alderson — at the time also wearing the GM cap — fired manager Luis Rojas to provide a blank slate for the next front office.
A year earlier, as the Mets scrambled to assemble a front office after Steve Cohen’s purchase of the team, Rojas had been retained as manager even though he wouldn’t be the handpicked choice of the new regime.
Two years earlier, Mickey Callaway was retained as the Mets manager amid a regime change that brought Brodie Van Wagenen into the general manager’s chair. Callaway was fired after Van Wagenen’s first season.
Now the Mets face another crossroads at which the manager wasn’t hired by the person in charge of baseball operations.
David Stearns agreed to a five-year contract with the Mets this week to become the president of baseball operations, effective at the regular season’s conclusion. Stearns, 38, spent this season as an advisor with the Brewers, for whom he previously headed the front office.
His first significant decision in his new job figures to be whether to keep Buck Showalter as manager.
The 67-year-old Showalter is certainly vulnerable as the Mets conclude a season that began with World Series aspirations but went terribly wrong. Showalter has another year remaining on his three-year contract, but it’s obvious Cohen, with his deep pockets, won’t let the roughly $4 million the manager is still owed prevent a potential change.
Stearns and Showalter have no history together, so the new president of baseball operations likely will lean heavily on Billy Eppler (who is expected to remain and keep the GM title) and Cohen for any information on the veteran manager.
It should be noted that Stearns, who inherited Craig Counsell in Milwaukee, has never fired or hired a manager.
Counsell, who is unsigned beyond this season, would be an intriguing possibility in Queens if he’s interested, but it’s also possible he will take a year or two to recharge before accepting another managerial gig. If Stearns wants to wait for Counsell, could Showalter be that bridge?
As the Mets head toward a 2024 season in which the focus might tilt toward retooling over competing for a championship, Showalter’s chief selling point is a résumé highlighted by his success as a rebuilder through player development.
Remember, it was Showalter and GM Gene Michael who nurtured much of the core from the Yankees’ world championship teams in the 1990s.
Showalter also was successful in helping build the Diamondbacks from the ground up, and helped oversee the Orioles’ transformation in the early 2010s, with a kid named Manny Machado in the lineup, into a playoff team.
Now the Mets have a bustling young crop of their own, which includes Francisco Alvarez, Ronny Mauricio and Mark Vientos — and let’s not yet count out Brett Baty — with a farm system that was bolstered by the trades this summer for Luisangel Acuña, Drew Gilbert and Ryan Clifford, among others.
Showalter is invested. He receives the daily minor league reports and watches video on the most highly regarded prospects. He’s not afraid to call around and ask questions about the farmhands. It’s been his modus operandi since the names were Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Bernie Williams and Andy Pettitte.
But it’s also possible Stearns just wants a fresh start with his own hand-picked manager. After all, this is an organization that has front office remnants from Alderson’s first tenure as general manager (2011-18), along with holdovers from the Van Wagenen and Jared Porter/Zack Scott regimes.
Starting over with a new manager would be a step toward streamlining, but if Showalter is deemed the right fit for the job, why change?
Stearns has at least 2 ½ weeks to contemplate it.
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Ranger danger
The Mets knew when to say “when” with Jacob deGrom and can also exhale knowing they likely got it right with their decision to deal Max Scherzer at the trade deadline.
Scherzer is expected to miss the rest of the season for Texas after he was diagnosed this week with a strained teres major (the same injury that derailed Justin Verlander for the first month of this season).
DeGrom underwent Tommy John surgery in June and won’t pitch for the Rangers until late next season at the earliest.
The Mets were willing to retain deGrom on a three-year deal, but likely weren’t going to match the five years and $185 million (plus a vesting option) he received from Texas. As it was, the Mets were never really given a chance to match the Rangers’ offer.
Scherzer, of course, was traded at this year’s deadline when it became clear the season wasn’t going as expected. Nobody will ever question Scherzer’s bulldog mentality, but the past few years have been a struggle for him physically.
The Rangers went all-in trying to win with him and deGrom this season, and now are in a struggle for a wild-card berth.
Paring down the winter shopping list
The most fascinating part of this offseason for the Mets might be how Stearns plans to address the starting rotation. The past two winters have shown the risk involved in targeting higher-end veteran pitchers, but the Mets are going to need the free-agent market if they plan to compete next year.
Will the Mets sign three pitchers — to match the number of vacancies they have behind Kodai Senga and Jose Quintana?
Some in the organization are prepared for the possibility the Mets sign only one free-agent starter and look to fill the other spots from within.
That mindset explains why team officials have been so interested in David Peterson, Tylor Megill and Joey Lucchesi lately. At least one will probably be needed at the back end of next year’s rotation.
Those were the days
The Mets will have a reunion with David Robertson next week in Miami. Robertson, who compiled 14 saves with the Mets this season, has pitched to a 6.00 ERA in 15 appearances since he was dealt to the Marlins at the trade deadline and was removed from the closer’s role.
Robertson was so effective for the Mets that the early buzz after he got traded was the Mets might try to re-sign him this offseason. His second-half woes (at 38 years old) might wave a caution flag in that direction.
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