As of yesterday, the New York Mets are officially searching for a new General Manager. The franchise began its first wave of interviews on Monday, Mike Puma of the New York Post reports, and is expected to have that phase wrapped up by Thursday. The Mets are expected to interview anywhere from 10-12 candidates for the position but only four are known at this time: Doug Melvin, Gary LaRocque, Kim Ng, and DeJon Watson.
The plan appears to be to whittle the list down to a group of finalists for a second round of interviews, most of which would likely occur next week. The Mets plan to make their finalists available to the media at that point as a way to gauge how they would interact with the New York media. Puma points to LaRocque as the early favorite due to his ties to the organization and his scouting background, but nothing is really certain at this point.
The Mets have also been toying with hiring a President of Baseball Operations along with the General Manager, giving the team a more modern approach to front office strategy. The problem, as Puma notes, is that a lot of candidates for the former position are bothered by the perception that COO Jeff Wilpon is way too involved in decision making. People who would want a President of Baseball Operations title would like the autonomy to do the job without constant meddling from ownership. Wilpon hasn’t done a good job discrediting that narrative of late, telling reporters late in the season that whoever the Mets hire to replace Alderson would bring their final recommendations to him while also saying that he doesn’t pick the players.
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