In a surprising turn of events on Thursday, Mets general manager Billy Eppler resigned from his role. He was initially expected to stay on as GM and work underneath new president of baseball operations David Stearns, who was officially introduced earlier in the week. However, Eppler reportedly stepped down so as not to be a distraction amidst an investigation into his improper use of the injured list, per Mike Puma, Joel Sherman, Jon Heyman, and Mark W. Sanchez of the New York Post.
After a massively disappointing finish in 2023, the Mets have their work cut out for them this offseason. However, as Andy Martino reports for SNY, the team isn’t in any hurry to find Eppler’s replacement. They plan to hire a new GM eventually, but with Stearns already in place to lead the front office, the Mets have not yet set a timeline for that particular task. In this day and age, having a separate GM and president of baseball operations is hardly a necessity. Several teams have one executive working both roles, including Alex Anthopoulos of the Braves, Mike Rizzo of the Nationals, and A.J. Preller of the Padres.
Presumably, the Mets are prioritizing the search for a new manager; it would be helpful to have a replacement for Buck Showalter by the Winter Meetings in December. Perhaps they’d also like to wait until the investigation into Eppler has wrapped up. It stands to reason they’d like to properly close the book on one GM before hiring another. By the time that’s complete and a new skipper is in place, Stearns might prefer to focus on improving the roster for 2024 and beyond, saving the task of finding a new general manager for a later date.
Trevor Bauer to the Mets. Cohen signs him to a 6 year $350mm contract.
Never see him again in MLB. Why don’t people get this?
I think he could come back but he has to show remorse and regret. He harmed baseball and his teammates. He needs to humble himself and pledge that while a player he will do what is best for baseball. Remember just because one victim was a fraud does not mean the other allegations were meritless
The issue with Bauer isn’t anything about the allegations or the outcome. “Bauer’s penchant for legal retaliation has been a central concern of MLB during its investigation.” He violated MLB’s intimidation rules that apply to these investigations. I just don’t see any teams wanting the PR nightmare.
Did the MLB enable it?
Didn’t the Mets open the season with only 2 or 3 Optionable relievers? They could have faked it better
If they were going to replace him with a “timeline”, I guess they figure he’s not too important. Besides, who keeps “timelines” in stock?
Tonight on Dateline, the fine line struggles of being online without a timeline.
Bold statement
A new GM is such a low priority considering they have David Stearns as POBO. Worry about the roster construction and hiring a new manager, a new GM can wait until way later.
It takes a lot to run a MLB team. The loss of Eppler will complicate things some as it will significantly increases Stearns workload just arrived, but he’ll put his own person in eventually.
Billy Eppler traded the best young pitcher in baseball (Bradish) and two other pitching prospects for the dried husk of Dylan Bundy. Then he gift wrapped James McCann as a late thanks you.
As an Os fan, I’m shedding tears. Billy is irreplaceable.
Ahh, so we have some uppity O’s after their team tanked for years and they all went into hiding.
We sure do miss James McCann and his 650 OPS
The Catcher is the most important position player on a team.
What he hits only matters in rotisserie league.
McCann is very probably the best backup catcher in MLB. The Mets tried to make him a starter. Dumb.
I have no timeline to absent the contents of my bowels, yet they will let go, yes they will let go…
Weirdo
Bah Gawd… Thats Craig Counsells music!
I know that 2024 is a reset year for the Mets, but you could build pitching easier this off-season. Something needed to compete 2025 and beyond.
I hope Stearns signs Yoshinobu Yamamoto and another starter for mid-rotation. Add Josh Hader to complement Edwin Diaz, and hope Ottavino declines his option to save some money.
I do not care much about positional players through free agency. Some additions and subtractions will happen. Just praying it doesn’t involve Alonso.
@NYMETSHEA They would need to promise Hader that the closer role is his. I’d love Hader, would give them the best one two punch in baseball. Diaz didn’t throw a single pitch last year, he needs to get acclimated. Diaz should pitch the 8th. I’d sign Sewald in the offseason and try to pull off a trade for Andres Munoz of the Mariners. The bullpen would be set for years to come. Thats been the Mets biggest weakness in the past 20 years
Sure the Mets will sign Hader but only after Diaz returns and they trade for both Camilo Doval and Devin Williams…….. NOT
NYM have some excellent prospects via those deadline deals. They are in better shape for the near future than many.
Ok, maybe it’s just ignorance on my part, but what exactly are the duties of a GM these days? It used to be GM and assistant GM, then someone created the President of Baseball Operations title and now some teams have a President of Baseball Operations, Vice President of Baseball Operations, GM and assistant GM. Like, what are they all doing? I swear this started with the Dodgers years ago when they hired like 5 GM’s and gave them all different titles.
This all started right around Moneyball when teams started building an analytics dept. With social media, PR departments expanded. Then you have more audio/video staff to provide real-time support for managers/players. It’s a lot more people for one person to manage today.
BTW, who attend(s) GM meatings with POBO?
Butchers or Dexter?
I always thought a pobo was a shrimp sandwich on a french roll.
I wish that I could upvote this comment one and a half times
That’s funny,yo!
I believe it really started with Theo Epstein when he went to the Cubs. He invented the PoBO title to make his status sound more grand, plus it allowed him to hire Jed with the nicer sounding GM title than an AGM title. In the end, it’s just title inflation.
No timeline? How bout after MLB completes their investigation of their predecessor. Maybe they can take down the crime tape as their first act. Or leave it up, for the inevitable.
“What exactly are the duties of a GM”?….The Pobo, GM and asst GM all have a HUGELY important singular duty in today’s MLB; to take the arrows, slings and bullets for the incredibly dumb moves made by the owner. You’re Welcome.
Honestly I can do a better job than these I’d.iots.
I called the Lindor, scherzer and verlander signings as busts and I was right.
I’d clean house, hire better scouting, development and create a culture.
I’d sign a guy like Joey votto or trade for the Dodgers Chris Taylor to create a winning culture.
Nothing but soft jack offs down in NY.
I’d like Chaim Bloom to be the GM of the Mets. He has a great sense of scouting out top prospects. Probably has a similar way of thinking to Stearns. Would really fix a lot of the issues in the Met organization
He might not be a bad choice at all, although Red Sox fans will likely disagree. With Stearns running overall operations, having Bloom as more of a second-in-command, as he was in Tampa, might work. Question is would he accept the #2 job? It’s not uncommon for PoBO’s or GMs who lose their jobs to land in another organization, but it’s often as an SVP advising the current head of baseball ops, which is different than taking a direct job as the #2. It’s usually a holding job until another head of baseball operations position opens up elsewhere, while the new team gets to have access to his expertise while he awaits.
Does he have much of a choice with the way he left Boston?
How many GM slots are open? A lateral move seems like it would make the most sense. He’s certainly not getting a promotion at this point.
I agree that he’s not getting a promotion, but taking a GM slot reporting to a PoBO would be a demotion. He was a PoBO., so this wouldn’t be a lateral move, it would be a step down. Alex Anthopoulos, after being canned as head of baseball operations for the Blue Jays, took a VP job with the Dodgers for a couple years, while awaiting for the right head of baseball ops position to open up. That’s the likely move for Bloom. Not a second-in-command GM doing all the grunt work for the PoBO.
Wow first post Eppler trade!! Mets acquire W. Franco from TB for Baty, Alvarez and Alonso. They also fudged his birth certificate to make him a lifetime 17 YO to get him out of his legal problems.
Definition of addition, by subtraction
What I am trying to figure out is why MLB is selectively investigating Eppler for doing something that every single GM has been doing since it was still called the Disabled List. There must have been something pretty alarming to MLB in that anonymous letter to prompt an investigation. MLB is cracking down on Injured List abuses but why? Did some player hint at a lawsuit for getting involuntarily ILed? I thought Syndergaard was a good candidate for the IL after a dozen bad starts. Sure enough, Thor ends up on the IL to collect sick pay and is traded subsequently. If it was obvious to me that he really wasn’t injured, then does this mean Friedman is in trouble too? It’s hard for me to believe this is solely about IL manipulation. It’s been going on for decades. What changed?
I don’t think the Angels have brains to do it.
The IL is a joke. Every team misuses it.
Teams go through over 30 and now 40 pitchers a year, Over 25 position players. They have 13 spots on the roster for each.
Tired pitchers are put on the IL before a series. If the opposition is weak against LH or RH or fastball pitchers, etc., they call up a fresh arm from the high minors, then put the pitcher back on the roster after the series, They do a similar thing with hitters. Fact is that teams need at least 35 quality players each year. Guys in the high minors are just on a virtual roster.
This could all be resolved by stating that after a player is on the IL for so many times and/or days, he’s not allowed back on the roster for 2 months or the entire season. It’s just MLB FO’s playing rotisserie league.
Steve Cohen should have fired both Eppler & Buck in June when everyone was calling for their heads and he would have been done with all of this as Spring Cleaning and maybe the Mets could have salvaged their Season with new leadership.
But no he had that presser where he announced that Eppler and Buck weren’t going anywhere. He would have been so much better off without the shivving and dropping of dimes and the carryover of this mess into the new offseason.
Who will come to the Mets with all of this uncertainty now? Behind the 8 Ball as always without a master plan to hit the ground running. Lol Mets to be continued.
If Cohen had fired both of them in June, fresh off of a 101 win season (their first 100+ win season since 1988), every doofus on earth would have been LOLMets-ing and mocking them, yourself included. Now, long after the fact, you think they should have done it.
Plus if Cohen would have done that, everyone would have been calling him a meddlesome, impulsive idiot and he’d have good people (like potentially David Stearns) turning him down for job offers. NY doesn’t need another James Dolan.
Rct,
I have been right about everything Mets and predicted this debacle.
I know the Mets having watched it all since 1967. I remember when they were great. I got mine ha ha. They haven’t been great since the late 80’s when I lived at Shea. In fact they have been lol Mets all throughout Wilpons and now even more so under Steve Cohen.
I have the true reference frame.
I have the true reference frame on all things Mets.
Rct,
I know we have disagreed most of the time regarding the Mets and you have labelled me a Mets hater, but I have a handle on the pulse and I know some internal aspects of the Organization which I can’t disclose which are highly explosive. There are serious issues which carryover from the Wilpon Mets that Steve Cohen is wearing blinders on and hasn’t addressed. Leave it there for now
Insider, eh, mate? you sound like a pensioner with too much time on your hands and not enough smarts to manage it.
BlackRock’s Larry Fink is rumored to be considering buying the Mets. Cohen is supposedly considering selling for $6.66 Billion.
C’mon Robrock…are you forgetting 2006? The last almost “great” Mets season, except for Beltran taking a called 3rd strike in game 7 of the NLCS.
Brooklyn62,
Actually I remember watching that game in Brooklyn in fact and couldn’t believe that the Mets lost the Game after the Endy Chavez catch. Beltran striking out on 3 pitches looking with the bases loaded in the 9th was the biggest choke job in Mets history. Instead of going to the WS which they could have won, they watched the Cardinals walk it off. The Mets had me believing that year.
Wasn’t in Brooklyn, jus saying.
I wasn’t at the Game at Shea in Flushing Queens silly.
I was watching on TV at a restaurant in Brooklyn with many others.
@Robrock,
Luv you,man! I love the fact that you’ve been a Mets fan since…1967! That is when I watched my first Mets game with my father and became a lifelong, long suffering Mets fan! I have read many of your comments on MLBTR, re;all things Mets. I must compliment you on your wonderful insights on the Mets.
I watched Mets since Tommy Davis and I remember him getting a standing ovation every time he came to bat because he was a Brooklyn Dodger. He only played with the Mets one year so I pegged the year I started watching to then. He was traded to the White Sox for Tommie Agee and Al Weis which resulted in the Championship of ’69 which I watched in Junior High School afternoons and from Home on the weekend. Great memories as I was practically the only Met fan I grew up amongst huge Yankee fans.
I was a kid in 1st grade in NJ when the Mets were in the 69 WS. My principal called an assembly and he wobbled in the giant b&w TV on the audio/visual cart and yelled out, ” The Mets are in the World Series!! This is history!” ,and we all watched game 4 when JC Martin got nailed in the throw down to 1b and the Mets won in 10 innings!
I was in 8th grade on a school bus heading to a soccer game with the school soccer team listening on a radio while that happened. I was jumping up and down celebrating.
Our soccer team was undefeated and we played a rival where a friend was on the opposing team and they loaded up their defense. I played right wing and we ended the game with a tie. So much fun
my uncle was a big Tommy Davis fan from his Brooklyn days,in high school to his MLB career. my uncle also gave me a Tommy Davis glove which I still have, so I was a big T.Davis guy, he was like a god in Brooklyn and would’ve have some better stats if not for his bad knees and ankles..
I think Stearns will root through the applications, but what he’s thinking is that if he assumes GM duties himself, that’s one less cook in the kitchen. When you’re self-employed you’re your own yes man.