No provisional titles. No quick searches. No bandages.
Sandy Alderson now has to take over the Mets ’baseball operations until next low season. It must bring stability and confidence to this department and make it attractive so that, in October / November 2021, the best candidates are presented to interview against what happened this last time.
The Mets were unable to recruit enough quality aspirants for president of baseball operations in Alderson’s opinion. So they introduced him and moved to hire a general manager and landed Jared Porter. And Porter has now landed at the Mets. He turned them back into the Wilpon Mets. An organization embraced by a black cloud.
Alderson had delivered a mission statement to Steve Cohen, which led to his hiring as team president. He imagined the Mets becoming a beacon rather than a laugh; implicit was to move away from the Wilpons towards a new reality. At his introductory press conference in November, he said these words to this thought: “We have the opportunity to be an iconic franchise … We have the opportunity to write an epic story.”
Then Alderson’s first big contract turned out to be a horrible closet. ESPN revealed Monday night that in 2016, while a Cubs executive, Porter had sent more than 60 texts and photographs of harassment and obscurity to a foreign journalist. Alderson said Porter copied that those were indeed his texts and images. The Mets had no choice but on Tuesday morning Porter was fired and, at 41, probably ended a career in Major League Baseball.
Porter’s runner-up Zack Scott was also hired to be GM’s executive vice president and assistant. The two had worked together in Boston. But those familiar with the Mets ’internal dynamics say Cohen and Alderson had been so impressed with Scott in the interview process that they pushed the idea to Porter rather than vice versa.
So the easy call here would be to elevate Scott or at least give him the provisional title.
The Mets shouldn’t. Scott was introduced largely to augment and build the Mets ’analytical wing. He was admired in Boston for his work in this area. But he was not seen as a dynamic figure, of the kind imaginable sitting on the podium and selling the visions of a big market team. At least not yet. So why rush even to give Scott the provisional label?
Consider this 12-month hearing. The Mets can see how it works. As it fosters culture within the organization, it is responsible for increasing responsibility, and so on. If all goes well, the job will still be there next low season and all Scott will do until then is the job he was hired for, but with a little more responsibility.
Recall that before hiring Porter and Scott, Alderson had led an operation signed by Trevor May and James McCann. They had begun the main task on the trade that would stop Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco. Those dealing with the Mets say Porter only made Alderson’s playbook work.
At that introductory press conference, Alderson had offered, “I’m not going to make baseball decisions. I’m waiting for a seat at the table, but not at the top of the table. “
But there’s a bit of Hyman Roth in “The Godfather: Part II.” Alderson is a personality and a thinker too old to have influence and not exercise it. So let’s not even pretend he’s not at the top of the table, especially now.
And that’s where it needs to be.
Because he and Cohen also do tests. When Cohen’s money was injected into a large market franchise, it was thought the candidates would go on to lead the Mets ’baseball operations. Cohen and Alderson were dismayed when this did not happen. One of the reasons why the best and brightest, those that Cohen and Alderson were initially convinced of, but would ask for work, were taken out of consideration for concerns with Cohen.
One of these candidates said “Black Edge” was passed as a library book among the best crops. This book detailed, among other articles, a toxic culture in Cohen’s SAC Capital, which disappeared after paying a record $ 1.8 billion fine for privileged transactions. Cohen’s monitoring company, Point72 Asset Management, resolved a claim last year with an employee alleging a sexist work environment.
These issues paused the owners before approving the purchase of the Mets by Cohen and sent a stop signal to candidates to run baseball operations.
So Alderson and Cohen have to prove this year that this is a new business, a new day, and the new Mets. Alderson must find the old Marine himself and take on the task of running baseball operations and providing relentless signs of success, job sanity, and persistent competition. You can’t add Scott or anyone who would come out of another search so close to the start of spring training, when there will be even more candidates out of bounds.
Cohen insisted his Mets would have integrity at their core, which he cited in firing Porter less than 12 hours after the terrible revelations.
This is only the first step in the first crisis. The next step should be for Alderson to do baseball operations for this year. It’s the best alternative to trying to turn another Mets epic disaster into an epic story.