PORT ST. LUCIE — David Stearns has expertly navigated two worlds so far running the Mets baseball operations — “threading the needle” in his words.
He has stated that the top priority in Year 1 of his administration is to prioritize the big picture — don’t jam up long-term payroll or roster space while fully learning what he has in his youngsters. Yet, Stearns has insisted that within those confines the team will try to maximize wins and expects to make the playoffs.
“You should be able to do both at the same time,” Stearns said.
For a top official running a team, Stearns has been remarkably publicly transparent and consistent about the approach — he has done what he has said he will do, whether you love his plan or not.
Within that plan two steps have already played out — the theory portion he offered Steve Cohen to be hired as president of baseball operations then the offseason execution to assemble a roster. But we already have nudged into Part 3: adaptation.
Stearns and Carlos Mendoza arrived with fresh eyes, and so did many on their staffs. They have been gaining first-hand experience with the players now. It is just the appetizer, and Stearns, in particular, downplays the importance of spring games when it comes to decision making — favoring instead all of the information the club has been gathering from back fields and meetings and viewing the incorporation of, say, new pitches or hitting approaches. And Stearns has shown a history of patience to let a strategy evolve more fully.
Nevertheless, the club’s interest in sudden free agent J.D. Davis — before he signed Friday with the A’s — felt like more than just the vigilance that Stearns promised to persistently seek upgrades. It resonated more like a new administration had watched a few weeks of Brett Baty and Mark Vientos and were having concerns similar to the scouts who cover the team regularly in spring — that neither may be capable of handling third base. The Mets had to at least contemplate a Plan B that was not Joey Wendle, whose OPS-plus has fallen from 108 in 2021 to 85 to 50 last season — the worst for any major leaguer with at least 300 plate appearances.
Davis might have been able to raise the floor at third to around league average if, say, by May 15 the Mets decided to veer. The Mets were a finalist, according to a source, but Davis picked the A’s to a large extent because he will be a free agent after this season and wanted assured regular time. That the Mets could not guarantee that reflects that Stearns is sticking with this plan and wants more information and certainty with Baty and Vientos.
Stearns would not discuss adding any specific player, but generally said, “As we’re looking at any particular decision point, does it tip the scale one way or the other [what’s good now vs. what is good in the big picture]? Do we think it tips the scales too far one way or the other? Those are the judgment calls that we’re constantly talking about as an organization.”
Stearns, offering a state-of-the-Mets session with reporters Friday at roughly the midpoint of spring games, said there is no magic date or number of plate or pitching appearances before he would abandon or bless an initial plan. In a separate interview, he said he tends to break the season into thirds (54 games) and assess at those points, but he is not religious on even that. He said “feel” is important, and that he is directed by individual and team results to determine a path.
But, in this moment, his “feel” that the Mets are a 2024 playoff team has only been refortified by a month of camp, Stearns said, due to what he is seeing on and off the field. Stearns is thought of as a dispassionate overseer, but he was enthusiastic particularly about Edwin Diaz’s Narco-introduction, three-batter, three-strikeout return to the mound Monday, calling it, “One of the coolest spring training moments I’ve ever seen.”
Just by way of verification, one scout who had never watched Diaz in person gushed, “I don’t think I have seen anything more impressive all spring. He was electric.”
Asked what has not gone as hoped, Stearns mentioned Kodai Senga’s right shoulder strain. But otherwise, he was happy about the pitching depth potential revealed so far this spring. It was part of an overall positivity espoused about the Mets less than two weeks before they face his old team, the Brewers, in the season opener.
If Stearns is right about what has been assembled, I wondered if it would lead to a recalibration of the needle-threading, with 2024 becoming the priority within his two-prong approach — notably trading prospects to go for it.
“As you get more information about the current season, you can adjust to the current season in a better manner,” Stearns said. “That may include getting aggressive in the current season. There’s nothing that precludes us from doing that.”
