Sandy Alderson is Sending Mixed Messages
An encouraging step toward stronger hiring processes seems counterproductive to Mets' chase of Trevor Bauer this winter
This offseason could have gone stark in contrast to how it shook out for the New York Mets.
Depth-minded construction of an actual, complete team could have taken a backseat to a couple of high-profile signings, leaving glaring deficiencies in some areas.
As Justin Toscano of The Record and I discussed on Monday’s episode of Simply Amazin’, there aren’t many holes in this roster.
The Mets reinforced this team across the board, and it could end up being the most important decision they made. Though it’s borderline doubtful that this was their plan all along.
On Monday morning, Alderson confirmed that the team was “aggressively” in on right-hander Trevor Bauer this winter before Bauer chose to sign with the Dodgers for three years with a total of $85 million being paid out in 2021 ($40 million) and 2022 ($45 million) with opt-outs existing after each season.
That type of investment in a pitcher who hasn’t been a consistent ace in this league and who also has a history of quite unsavory behavior on social media (look it up) could have considerably cut into Mets owner Steve Cohen’s sustainable-success model.
When asked about the team’s pursuit of outfielder George Springer, Alderson noted “at some point, even Steve Cohen runs out of money” with regards to having to extend outfielder Michael Conforto soon.
Frugality is certainly in the back of this organization’s mind. That’s encouraging to an extent. Drunken sailors, they are not.
Alderson did confirm the team would be moving ahead with discussions to extend Conforto and shortstop Francisco Lindor, as well as right-hander Noah Syndergaard, expecting talks to begin “relatively soon” with regards to Conforto and Lindor.
Clearly, the Mets have internal plans of their own. Expensive plans, to boot. Why throw it all into flux? Especially for a pitcher who, again, hasn’t been the model of consistency on or off the field?
Earlier in the press conference, Alderson mentioned that — in the wake of multiple cases of sexual harassment in and around the organization in recent years — the team was attempting to strengthen their hiring process.
“With respect to the vetting process, we’re being more intentional about communicating with women who may have had some contact — not necessarily former employees, but other third parties that might have come in contact [with potential hires]. We’re trying to be more intentional about that.”
When asked about the team’s futile attempt to sign Bauer despite the baggage that would have come along, Alderson noted they “thought they could manage” his behavior, adding, “maybe that was naive; we’ll see”.
“I’m not here to say, ‘wow, we dodged a bullet’. I’m here to say we made an effort, we thought he would help our team, we understood what the risks were associated with some of the social media stuff. We actually had discussions internally with a group or groups in our organization to talk about that, including women.”
“He’s a quality player so we start there and then we work our way through some of the other issues. We did a lot of homework on [Bauer’s] social media.”
“As I mentioned earlier, we had internal conversations talking about his social media presence […] Whether that presence was directed at a particular group of people or was just generally aggressive.”
We’re not going to go through the instances out of respect for the people who were harassed online by Bauer’s followers following each situation, but one would assume those instances alone would have been enough to pass, even on a “quality player”.
“That’s not to say that there weren’t still risks associated with it,” Alderson went on to say. “I never talked to Trevor myself. We talked extensively to the agent about what we thought would be necessary at the outset in terms of taking responsibility for what had happened in the past and taking some responsibility for what might happen in the future.”
“We weren’t being naive, I don’t think, in the sense that, OK, we can turn this guy around on a dime and turn him into something that he wasn’t before,” he said. “We felt we could manage it and it’s possible that we wouldn't have been able to. But at this point, we won’t have to worry about it.”
What I’m hearing is that Bauer didn’t want boundaries set on his behavior and chose to go in another direction. We kinda figured that was the case. But with all of this evidence readily available to Alderson and the Mets, why even take that chance?
Plainly, there are pockets of this fan base that feel the organization betrayed them by going hard after Bauer. And I don’t blame them.
What the Mets’ pursuit said to some of those concerned die-hards is, “We don’t care; we just want to win”. That might not be the intended message, but that’s how some took it. And rightly so.
Alderson’s stance on righting the organizational ship and casting a wider net with regards to prior instances of harassment of any type is great.
But when the Mets openly chase a player who arguably takes part in online harassment, well, the counterproductivity is just laughable.
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Agree 100%. I never understood the pursuit of Bauer after what happened with Porter and Callaway. I think it was Doug Williams on SNY who said if the Mets signed Bauer, they were going to have to have a very long intro press conference to explain themselves. Personally, I never wanted Bauer the player (who only twice had an ERA under 4.18) or Bauer the person (the harassment history is a real concern), and especially for $40M+ per year. If there was one free agent to overpay for this offseason, it was Springer. Now, hopefully that money goes into the Lindor and Conforto extensions (would love a Syndergaard extension too). Really love what the Mets did with the rotation this offseason without Bauer. Carrasco is a better #2 than Bauer anyway. I don't think the rest of the rotation gets enough credit: Stroman, Walker, Peterson, plus the return of Syndergaard are too often overlooked. I think they'll do great things this year. Not to mention the depth options of Lucchesi and Yamamoto. This rotation is ready to rock! Let's Go Mets!
Exactly. The message is that they'll do the perfunctory "homework" and then chase winning at all costs anyways. Especially if the target is talented enough. Which is more modus operandus for how pro sports organizations address poor or unethical behavior.