The Mets hierarchy tends to destroy the hopes and dreams of people who opt to join “The Team.” Brodie Van Wagenen could be the next…
Mets General Manager Brodie Van Wagenen is not the best thing since sliced bread. But he did come here with enthusiasm and dedication to the job he signed up for.
Similarly, Terry Collins and Mickey Callaway took on the same responsibility and pressures involved in joining a franchise on life support, despite the good people who work for and believe in the players who assemble in the clubhouse every day.
Mistakes and missteps? You can write a book about the ones each has made, and with Callaway and Collins, they’ll own up to them. Eventually, however, each said “no mas,” letting themselves be “fired” rather than continuing the charade.
Brodie Van Wagenen will soon, if not now, look in the mirror to ask himself – “Is this where I want to be at this point in the career I have chosen?”
The Mets Very Slippery Slope
The Wilpons can and probably will dismiss Van Wagenen after the 2020 season if the Mets don’t do – what?
See, the Wilpons do not lead as Hal Steinbrenner does with the Yankees in saying publicly – I expect us to win everything this season. Instead, as they did with Callaway, they’ll fire him anyway after he led a challenged team to finish ten games over .500.
Ex-agents, as General Managers, are the trend in professional sports. Why? – it’s anyone’s guess, but in the NBA Rob Pelinka, Lon Babby, Jason Levien, Justin Zanik, and Arn Tellem have all taken on the post with no previous experience in the front office.
Brodie Van Wagenen proceeded down the same path when the Mets pulled the genie out of the lamp, awarding him the job in 2018.
Major League Baseball, however, has proven to be more “old school” in their hiring of general managers, counting only Dave Stewart as a former player agent to take a turn as GM with the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Coincidence or not, Stewart last all of a few seasons in that post (2014-2017). Is the fate of Van Wagenen soon to be the same?
Mets Van Wagenen’s Precarious Future
General Managers in baseball typically don’t last very long. Remarkably, Brian Cashman of the New York Yankees is entering his 23rd season with the team, but that is the exception and indeed not the rule.
And perhaps that is why there are only four GM’s enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame (Ed Barrow, Branch Rickey, George Weiss, and Larry MacPhail).
So, what I’m suggesting is this. For Brodie Van Wagenen, his career choices are limited – while at the same time, he finds himself working for a “company” in complete disarray.
MLB Is Not The NBA
MLB is not the NBA, whereas recently as this week, the New York Knicks are set to hire former player agent Leon Rose as their next GM. Jobs are scarce.
But what is an honorable man to do? Does Brodie wait for the inevitable to happen, as it did most recently with Callaway and Collins and countless times before with well-intentioned employees of the Mets?
Or does he opt to walk the plank as predecessors Jerry Manuel, Willie Randolph, and Omar Minaya have in the recent past?
Randolph, especially, is left to leave the Mets scratching his head as to – why?
This is not to raise Van Wagenen to a level higher than any of his predecessors. In fact, given his performance in several misguided trades, anything else is real.
But it is to shed light on the ongoing inability of the Mets organization (read Fred and Jeff Wilpon) to retain individuals possessing a desire and ability to make sound baseball decisions on behalf of the team.
How Far Will The S–T Float Downhill
As we know, s__t floats down, and that is precisely the problem facing the Mets in 2020.
There will be a fallout from the Wilpon’s sleaziness in causing the team’s sale to Steve Cohen. It will extend to Van Wagenen, and, when it does, then what happens next.
My problem (Van Wagenen’s) becomes your problem (Luis Rojas), and unless Rojas can stem the tide from there, all of a sudden, the chaos reaches the 26 players in the clubhouse – and God knows what happens from there with the 2020 season.
If I were Brodie Van Wagenen, I’d have one foot in and one foot out, because no matter how you try to make lemonade out of lemons, until the Wilpons are history, the die is cast.
Baseball, it is said, is only a game. True. And the Grand Canyon is only a hole in Arizona. Not all holes, or games, are created equal.
