According to the Daily News, Wally Backman believes his interview with Sandy Alderson on Saturday went pretty good.
“I thought it went very well,” Backman told the Daily News Saturday night. “But out of respect to the Mets and the interview process, I’m not going to comment any further.”
Backman met with Alderson for three hours. Minor league field coordinator Terry Collins will meet with Alderson today.
The Record’s Bob Klapisch examines the comparison between Backman and Collins who is reported to be the front-runner.
Hiring someone without a notable winning pedigree would be a risk for Alderson, especially in an overheated environment like New York. That’s why Backman’s candidacy is no less intriguing to Alderson than Collins’ — because hiring Wally would be a gamble, albeit a different one.
There are plenty of critics who believe Backman should be permanently disqualified to manage the Mets because of his DUI conviction and domestic issues. These transgressions were enough to keep the Diamondbacks from hiring Backman in 2004, four days after they’d initially offered him the job.
But if Alderson is going to judge Backman on what happened prior to 2004, he should be fair enough to take into consideration how Backman has lived his life since then: There’ve been no incidents or episodes whatsoever. By all accounts, Backman’s behavior as manager of the Class A Brooklyn Cyclones this year was unblemished. He led the Cyclones to a 51-24 record — the only team in the Mets’ minor league system that posted a winning record.
I agree with Klapisch and feel that strong consideration should be given to Backman’s behavior since 2004 which by all accounts has been solid. Given his ability to stay clean and out of trouble, what happened six years ago should not be a disqualifier and Backman should be judged no differently than any of the other candidates. Lets keep this process fair.
As some of you know, my choice for Mets manager would have been Ryne Sandberg or Eric Wedge – one is no longer an option and the other isn’t even a consideration.
As for this current crop of candidates, they all have some sort of Mets ties and I was hoping for something more unique, original and out of the box. Obviously, many of these candidates were strongly reccomended by the Wilpons. It would have been interesting to see who the new GM would have interviewed if he was operating without a preconceived list of candidates from Fred and Jeff. I really don’t have a preference because they each have good and bad points and none of them really excite me. I trust that Alderson will make the right call.
