NEW YORK – Ever since the Aug. 3 MLB Trade Deadline came and went, the Mets have played well, going 10-4 entering Wednesday’s action against the Padres.
The results have pleased owner Steve Cohen. He enjoys watching younger players like Carson Benge and A.J. Ewing, two rookies who have brought a spark to a team that has struggled for most of the season. The recent results have made Cohen optimistic that 2027 will be a different story.
“It’s fun to see some of these younger players come up,” Cohen said. “They have worked hard in their careers and started to demonstrate that they are pretty good at what they do, too. It’s fun for the fans. Winning is better than losing. It’s creating a little excitement and, hopefully, it will carry through the end of the year and it will give us good feelings for next year.”
Cohen reiterated he is committed to David Stearns, the team’s president of baseball operations, turning the Mets into a winning franchise next year. Cohen acknowledged the front office has made mistakes.
To the owner, Stearns took “too much risk” with all the changes that were made before the season started. The Mets hired a new coaching staff for then-manager Carlos Mendoza, traded Brandon Nimmo to the Rangers for second baseman Marcus Semien and let Pete Alonso become a free agent and sign with the Orioles. Some of the players Stearns added to the roster – Semien, Jorge Polanco and Devin Williams – have struggled or gotten injured.
“David is smart. He knows what he is doing. He is very adaptable. He has learned from mistakes. That’s what I want to eliminate,” Cohen said. “There was too much risk when you think about all the changes that were made. Whenever there are significant changes, sometimes, it takes a while to integrate. Those are the things that I’m looking at and where we could be better.
“When you add new players, a coaching staff and adding players with an injured history and you add risk upon risk … it doesn’t mean it has to turn out bad; it just means you have dispersions of results and maybe the possibility of an undesirable result. It’s more of a possibility because of the risk you are taking.… I look at it as a whole. When I look at it as a whole, I see individual decisions that make perfect sense. But when you add it all up, then you get into a different realm of, did he take too much risk? It’s looking at it from a top/down perspective as opposed to an individual decision.”