Last Sunday, the hearts of New York Jets and New York Mets fans were crushed almost simultaneously. The Jets lost to the Steelers 37-15 to send their season teetering not long before the Mets’ season ended in the NLCS 10-5 against the Dodgers. For Mets/Jets fans, it was a particularly miserable night.
The difference between the two franchises could not be more stark, though. The Mets made the playoffs after a thrilling ride and won two playoff series before taking the first-seeded Dodgers to a sixth game. The Jets went all-in on 2024 only to have it blow up in their faces in spectacular fashion.
Neither team has a perfect core in place going forward. The Jets don’t have a quarterback. The Mets don’t have at least three starting position players, three starting pitchers, and most of their bullpen.
Crucially, though, the Mets have something the Jets do not: an experienced front-office executive to steer the team in the right direction.
When Steve Cohen bought the Mets, he made little secret of the fact that he wanted to hire David Stearns as his president of baseball operations. It took a few years and some bungles along the way, but Stearns is running the show.
Time will tell if he was the right hire, but Cohen went after someone with an analytical background, a history of getting a lot out of a little as the president of baseball operations in Milwaukee, and a finely honed philosophy of team-building from a successful franchise (assistant general manager of the Houston Astros).
The Jets, meanwhile, haven’t had someone who knows what he’s doing in any sort of leadership capacity since Bill Parcells’ brief tenure. (Perhaps Mike Tannenbaum’s early years as the general manager qualify, as well.) The only way out of this mess is to find one.
The Jets thought they were getting that guy in Joe Douglas. Douglas spent 14 years as a scout with the Baltimore Ravens and three seasons as the vice president of player personnel with the Philadelphia Eagles. Those are two model franchises and seemingly a good place to seek a president of football operations and general manager.
However, Douglas had no experience as a general manager in any capacity, not even as an assistant general manager. The job of a GM is far more encompassing than just personnel evaluation (not to say Douglas has been great at that, either).
To an extent, this is Monday morning quarterbacking. I thought Douglas was a good hire when the Jets brought him on. I’m still not sure exactly where they went wrong or how to correct the issue. But the Jets must be able to identify that guy and bring him in. Someone who will hire the right coach and set the right vision forth for the team.
Perhaps that’s impossible given Woody Johnson’s meddling. Cohen took a step back and ceded virtually all control to Stearns. He preferred not to be overly involved in matters in which he has little expertise, particularly when his efforts of the first few years met mostly with failure. Sticking his nose in seems to be a compulsion for Johnson, especially as active as he is on X and as sensitive as he is to public perception.
Still, Johnson will need to sit back and, for lack of a better term, shut up. Whoever he hires should demand no less from him.
Another lesson the Jets can take from Stearns’ hiring is his overhaul of many aspects of the Mets’ organization. There was institutional rot through multiple levels of the Mets, too: their scouting, their player development, their minor league system, their executive department, everything. So what did Stearns do? He fired and replaced the rot.
Not always does this work, but the Mets already showed signs of improvement this season, particularly in their pitching department. Sean Manaea and David Peterson did not suddenly break out by accident.
The inner workings of the Jets organization are often shadowy, but perhaps taking a hard look at what has remained stagnant is in order. How many scouts have been around since the last time the team made the playoffs? What is team president Hymie Elhai’s role, and does it affect the dysfunction of the team? When Douglas fired some of the team’s personnel executives, did he merely promote underlings rather than hiring from outside?
The Jets need someone to take a hard look at these issues. If they cannot get the right president of football operations to make the decisions, they should hire outside consultants until they find the right person.
I’m not even going to propose names here. Identifying good general manager candidates is harder than head coaching ones from an outsider’s perspective. But just as Cohen found a leader who fit the right criteria for success, Johnson must find a way to do so.
Otherwise, the Jets’ cycle of ineptitude will continue.
