The Mets search for a head of baseball operations (president of baseball operations, general manager, whatever you want to call it; it’s basically the main decision-maker for the baseball side) has now continued through the General Manager Meetings.
In fact, the search for a permanent baseball ops leader has been happening for most of Steve Cohen’s ownership of the team. There was Jared Porter and his suspension for sending unsolicited sexually explicit photos of himself to a female journalist. There was Zack Scott and the DUI that ended up getting him fired. Now they’ve been turned down by a litany of candidates and perhaps a story on The Athletic paints a clear picture on at least one reason why that’s been happening.
The report indicates the Mets are zeroed in on Brewers president David Stearns, but Brewers owner Mark Attanasio has denied the Mets permission (on two separate occasions; last season and this offseason) to interview Stearns. The key takeaway, however, is right here:
New York is operating under the belief that Stearns’ contract runs out after the 2022 season, and sources indicate that Stearns has serious interest in the position.
Stearns was born and raised in Manhattan and reportedly grew up a Mets fan. As such, it seems pretty likely running the Mets would be a dream job for him.
Now, let’s attempt to sort this out.
First off, if the Mets really want Stearns that badly and the feeling is mutual — but it can’t happen until after next season — it makes all kinds of sense that every other candidate to this point has turned the Mets down. Why would you take a job with Stearns looming to knock you down a peg after just one year? Sure, it’s a plum job, but as a one-year, lame duck?
Anyone taking the job would then have to assume there’s a move to the number two position after a year while sitting with team president Sandy Alderson looming above for the 2022 season. He’s made it publicly known that he would be working with any new hire this coming season.
There’s also the question of tampering. If Stearns has been explicitly told by someone with the Mets the job is his once his deal is up, that’s absolutely tampering and Brewers would have grounds for a grievance against the Mets. And what if Stearns knows he’s going to take the Mets job once his deal is up? Would he really be operating in good faith with the Brewers this season?
None of this is to accuse either side of anything. The Mets could very easily just be waiting out Stearns’ deal while he could also be thinking it’s an “I’ll cross that bridge if I come to it” situation.
We can give people the benefit of the doubt here while simply saying that the situation is chock full of hypotheticals.
Stearns would be a home run hire, though.
His first front office job came with Cleveland in December of 2011 and we know what a good decade that franchise had. He joined the Astros late in 2012 and was with them through the rebuild until the Brewers hired him in September of 2015. When he took over, the Brewers had only made the playoffs four times in franchise history. They’ve now made it four straight years. In 53 seasons, the club has won at least 95 games in a season five times. Two of those five have come during Stearns’ tenure, including 2021.
Not only that, but Stearns is operating under the constraints of a small market. Sure, Attanasio doesn’t operate like, say, the Rays or A’s, but there are still limited resources in Milwaukee that Stearns wouldn’t face if he was running the Mets. Just imagine how much better he could do his job without worrying about payroll.
He’d be worth the wait.
Of course, if there’s a year before the Mets can grab Stearns and there hasn’t been anything nefarious happening with the process — which, again, is entirely plausible — whoever does take the Mets job will be working with Alderson in making some pretty damn big decisions.
The rotation has lost Marcus Stroman and Rich Hill to free agency. Noah Syndergaard has been offered a qualifying offer. From the offense, Michael Conforto, Jonathan Villar, Kevin Pillar and Javier Báez are free agents. The bullpen needs to be dealt with. They might not have a huge chunk of money to spend, with an estimated payroll sitting above $175 million right now, but there are holes to be filled and the team is too veteran-laden and talented to rebuild. This was just a cursory look, obviously. Basically, it’s a big job in looking out building out the 2022 Mets.
And yet, all signs indicate the Mets would like to wait a year on Stearns while Alderson hires someone to operate under his watchful eye for a season.
It’s quite the soap opera. Maybe one day it’ll be an “all’s well that ends well” situation. For now, it’s a bit of a mess.
