In his first public appearance as owner and CEO of the New York Mets on Tuesday afternoon, Steve Cohen dazzled, setting the desired tone and filling the Flushing faithful’s collective heads with visions of fast-tracked contention and long overdue glory.
This fan base has seen the very worst that ownership can bring to the table — no need to rehash those terrors here. Now, the time has come to see how the other half lives.
To Mets fans, Cohen expressed gratitude. A quick scroll through Twitter at around 1 PM EST on Tuesday would be all the evidence needed to prove those thanks are reciprocated tenfold.
“Your support has been incredible. You want us to win the World Series and so do I,” Cohen said. “New York fans have high expectations and I want to exceed them. I want an exceptional team. I want a team that’s built to be great every year.”
Later, speaking on his interactions with fans on Twitter over the past few days, Steve Cohen let his blue and orange flag fly even higher.
“I’m doing it for [the fans]. I relate to them. I know how they feel. These are smart fans. They know what they’re talking about,” he said. “And if they’re emotional, it means they care. I’d rather have emotional fans that are passionate than fans that don’t care.”
Well, that’s all very refreshing. For the better part of a decade, Mets fans have been conditioned to absorb and digest pure [lip service] from this organization. Some have even honed their skills so finely as to sniff it out the second it’s spewed.
What Mets fans heard on Tuesday afternoon was no such thing. Not one word of it.
“I’m going to be an owner who builds a team that has continued success. We want to create a blueprint for winning,” Cohen said. “We are starting with our homegrown talent and building from there. When we need to fill a gap, we will fill it. It might be with a free agent, or it might be through a trade.”
Judging by what we heard from Cohen and Mets president Sandy Alderson on Tuesday — mind the pun — this is going to be a whole new ballgame for the New York Mets.
During his time with the Mets media corps, Alderson told reporters, “We now emphasize the acquisition rather than the cost,” which is a complete one-eighty in organizational philosophy since Alderson’s previous stop in Queens — and a welcome shift, at that.
As for transforming the woebegone culture of this franchise into one of prominence, relevance, and magnificence, Cohen appears to already have a plan in place: Just do the opposite of whatever the last regime did.
“We’re going to strengthen our farm system, keep our players healthy, and use the best analytics. We’re going to build a process that produces great teams year in and year out.”
“You build champions; you don’t buy them. We have a great core on this team, and we’re going to get better. And I plan to make the investments we need to succeed. We want to win now, but we’re also building for the long-term.”
The best part is, the wave of optimism rushing through Flushing hasn’t even approached a crest yet. With a full offseason ahead of the Mets and a newfound dedication to fielding a winner — not just pretending to — the sky’s the limit.
That’s all the culture change we need for one day, but it’s fair to assume there’s a lot more to come. LFGM.
