David Stearns has the credentials and the background — both professionally and as a fan — to be an ideal hire to run Mets baseball operations.
One longtime rival said, “I think he’s far and away the best guy available.”
When asked why, the executive responded: “Because he’s good at his job.”
That was minimalist, but summed up a few weeks of inquiring widely on the subject of what kind of executive Stearns is; since his being hired for this job felt as inevitable for a while now as the eighth inning following the seventh.
Steve Cohen was frustrated for three years in his attempts to fill this position — due to those who contractually he was not allowed to speak with or due to those who were disinterested in the role over fear of Cohen’s reputation and/or New York. Once Stearns stepped down as the Brewers’ president of baseball operations after last season and instead served as the Queen of England — I mean an adviser to ownership — to run out the last year on his Milwaukee contract, it was the equivalent of batting his eyes across the bar to Cohen.
The Mets’ owner had publicly stated that he would exhibit patience to hire the right person. That was an easier statement when he knew the right person would contractually be available on Aug. 1. And Stearns was the right person, especially once it became clear that Theo Epstein’s interest is in forming an ownership group to purchase a team and that Jeff Luhnow was not going to be a serious candidate. Cohen was not going to wait this long and then hire anything less than a five-star choice.
It helps that Stearns comes with an asset beyond doing a superb job running the small-market Brewers. The Mets matter to him. He grew up a fan on the Upper East Side. He was a spectator when Mike Piazza famously homered in the first game back at Shea Stadium after the 9/11 attacks. He was an intern for the team and he has roots remaining here, since his mom is still a Manhattanite.
Obviously, though, he was not enlisted just for fandom or else Cohen could have saved time (and money) by just employing the most rabid WFAN caller. A former co-worker of Stearns described the no-brainer aspect of what Cohen did, thusly. “David is awesome. This is a slam-dunk hire.”
Those who have worked with Stearns describe someone who is perpetually the smartest guy in the room, but never wears it or wears people down with it. He is collaborative and creative, but when it comes to decisionmaking time he will pare down his inner circle or just go it alone. His passion is to run the major league team and to empower department heads to have latitude over their realms.
In Stearns’ Brewers tenure beginning in September 2015, he often changed the complexions and the strengths of the roster based on what was available and fit into Milwaukee’s compact payrolls. In his last five seasons in charge, the Brewers made the playoffs four straight years and then missed by one game in 2022. He enhanced a strong handoff of talent bequeathed him by predecessor Doug Melvin, which included an elite manager in Craig Counsell, who is going to be a desirable free agent after this season if he chooses to leave Milwaukee and keep managing.
Stearns fits the part of what is needed — passionate about the Mets, familiar with the market, young (38), proven, bright, etc. What we find out now is if the right actor for the role actually makes a great project.
Because Stearns will know well from his fandom, working as an intern for the Mets and competing against them, that the franchise’s history reflects a failure to sustain stability, professionalism and winning. The number of executives over the last three decades in particular who have tried and failed reads like the lyrics to Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire” — Richard Nixon did not come back again as much as Omar Minaya, Sandy Alderson and John Ricco. This has been a job that has wrecked more reputations than made them.
Stearns at the outset will be at the mercy of whether Billy Eppler has done well in the last two drafts and in those surrender trades of David Robertson, Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander. And whether Cohen’s patience is as great with Stearns in the job as he was waiting for him to be available for it. And whether the fan base recognizes that a 38-year-old with a five-year contract is not here to emphasize 2024, regardless of how different his financial resources will be between Milwaukee and New York.
Cohen waited because he sees Stearns as an ideal to pilot his vision of the Dodgers East — a perennial, self-sustaining contender with a financial knockout punch when necessary. Stearns enters as the obvious right choice for this job. Can the fan of the team change its history?