Billy Eppler offered encouragement, not pink slips.
The Mets general manager met with Buck Showalter and the coaching staff Friday after a gut-punch three-game sweep in Atlanta and prior to a three-game series vs. the Pirates to double down that he believes they are the leadership group to rectify the widespread problems besetting the roster.
“We have an experienced coaching staff and we have confidence in them,” Eppler told The Post, using coaching staff to define all on-field, in-uniform support staff, including Showalter. “That isn’t an acknowledgement that everything is fine. But it’s an acknowledgment that we have the personnel to get this right. There are things that are not going right that we need to address. Offensively at times, defensively at times, base running at times, pitching at times. But making changes for the sake of making changes isn’t going to deliver us our desired outcome.”
Eppler mainly apprenticed his way up the baseball ladder with the Yankees and GM Brian Cashman, eventually reaching assistant GM. In his quarter of a century as a GM, Cashman has never dismissed a coach or manager during the season. Eppler has followed the same path, to date, as the Angels GM for five years and the Mets GM for a year-plus.
“As a baseball operation, both on field and off the field personnel, our job is to help get our players back to the best version of themselves, and ideally to optimal,” Eppler said. “And it’s my job to continue to look for pieces that can help both internally and externally. And it’s the job of our coaches to get the players prepared to play, to support them and to optimize them. And that’s where our focus is right now.”
The Mets had lost six straight games to fall to 30-33 entering the three-game series in Pittsburgh. Injury and underperformance have wobbled the by far largest payroll team in MLB history.
Eppler would not provide insight into how owner Steve Cohen is viewing the losing record. Eppler said he would not expressly evaluate Showalter separate from the coaching staff, feeling it would just lead to more questions and speculation and insisting that his support and belief are strong for the manager and the coaches.
“I believe in the experience and the track record,” Eppler said.
As for if he is feeling the hot seat, Eppler would only offer, “My focus right now is on our baseball team.”
After winning 101 games in their first season on the job, but blowing the NL East in the last week to the Braves, Eppler and Showalter plus Mets players are all enduring a more intense and negative level of scrutiny in 2023. Booing is up at Citi Field. And the trade/fire/cut quotient also has risen in evaluations of the team.
To the noise that comes with big expectations and large payroll playing to such a poor level so far, Eppler said: “We have high standards and high expectations for ourselves. And we carry that as our own obligation and our own duty day to day. We want to win baseball games. For our fans and our supporters. We want to do it for the city. We want to do it for our owner. We want to do it for each other. That’s our goal. We take that as a duty and obligation … it is a duty and obligation and it’s our job to figure it out and support our players as much as we can, in any which way that we can.”
Eppler said he did not want to discuss any specific players. In general, he said that underlying and peripheral statistics remain solid for most veterans who are currently below their norms. When it was noted that a not insignificant 63 games had passed and what he expected from those below expectations, Eppler said, “That for 99 games they will perform to their accustomed level.”
Eppler then added this caveat: “Unless there’s a material change in the player. You know, through the metrics that drive performance. Through swinging and missing, through loss of exit velocity, through change in trajectory of the ball off the bat, then yes (without those changes), I would expect (familiar results by the end of the season).”
Eppler would not provide who he believes has had downturns in those underlying metrics. But he was willing to discuss one player because Daniel Vogelbach has become such a polarizing figure. Eppler obtained the lefty-swinger last July and this season and has maintained his DH role vs. lefty starters despite hitting .203 with two homers and a .639 OPS, and being a base clogger when he does reach.
“Daniel’s working extremely hard at getting the ball off his bat at his accustomed trajectory,” Eppler said. “He is in the top four or five in exit velocity on our team, but he’s not getting the trajectory that he has had in the past and so that is a point of emphasis for him. But he has a track record dating back to 2017 of hitting right-handed pitching. So we’re supporting him, we care about him. And we’re doing everything in our power to get him feeling right and he’s very committed to it.”