The team that David Stearns was most responsible for on Opening Day at Citi Field won.
Unfortunately for the 42,137 in attendance, it was the Brewers.
The three best players on the field Friday afternoon were Freddy Peralta, Christian Yelich and Jackson Chourio, who represent the two best trades Stearns made in his seven-plus years running the Brewers’ baseball operations and the best amateur international signing.
If these were coming attractions of what Stearns might be able to craft while in charge of the Mets, then long term all is well. But a few hours after Steve Cohen reiterated that a successful season would be defined by making the playoffs in 2024, the Mets’ offense was being booed late in what became a 3-1 loss.
These were not the Mets in full, of course. J.D. Martinez — a signing by Stearns — is still more than a week away from slotting behind Pete Alonso. Jose Quintana was starting Opening Day rather than Kodai Senga, who the Mets are unlikely to get back before June.
But the Brewers traded their own ace and the best draft pick of Stearns’ tenure, Corbin Burnes, to Baltimore during the offseason and are likely without No. 2 starter Brandon Woodruff for the 2024 campaign as he recovers from shoulder surgery. But Peralta was a dynamic No. 3 and now ace — a stuff machine obtained by Stearns in December 2015 from Seattle for the fading memory of Adam Lind.
Peralta did yield a second-inning homer to Starling Marte. Marte was the silver lining on Opening Day for the Mets, delivering three hard-struck balls after an injury-disrupted 2023 and a healthy, yet worrisome spring training. On the not silver lining side, Marte’s homer was the lone hit the Mets produced — or two fewer than Yelich, who homered lefty on lefty against Quintana in the fourth inning.
In the Marlins’ sell-off that sent (among others), Giancarlo Stanton to the Yankees, Stearns acquired Yelich for a four-player package that proved devoid of impact — particularly for a future NL MVP. As for Chourio, Stearns said the Brewers’ international scouting department was starry-eyed about him even years before officially signing the outfielder for $1.9 million in January 2021.
Stearns’ successor, Matt Arnold, was in charge this offseason when Milwaukee gave Chourio the largest contract ever ($80 million for eight years) for a player who had yet to play in the majors. Such was the belief in a player who at 20 years and 18 days old became the youngest to start an opener since Hall of Famer Adrian Beltre in 1999. Chourio responded with a hit, walk, RBI forceout, stolen base and two strong defensive plays in right field.
Stearns simply has not had the time to imprint the Mets in a similar fashion. His plan, sanctified by Cohen hiring him after last season, was to not be bold in free agency beyond trying to sign 25-year-old Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who went to the Dodgers. Instead, it was to emphasize long-term roster flexibility and a desire to see young players while also trying to get into the October tournament. Thus, Harrison Bader, batting ninth, was the only Stearns acquisition among the Mets’ starting 10. At this point, Stearns’ influence with the Mets is still more philosophical than overt.
Nevertheless, enthusiasm and a sellout crowd greeted the day. Edwin Diaz, after missing all of last season, was given the most rousing ovation in the pregame introductions. Cohen and Stearns offered versions of believing in the composition of the 2024 club both in talent and temperament — and also in minor league depth, another element that at best will play over the full 162.
But in Game 1, after Marte’s homer, the pitching of the Brewers slowly took the energy and joy out of the crowd. It was not until Jeff McNeil took exception to a late, but legal slide by former Phillies nemesis Rhys Hoskins, which triggered expletives from the second baseman, mocking from Hoskins and the benches and bullpens to empty, that the fans were re-engaged.
The problem was that the Mets’ offense was not re-engaged or re-energized. Two hours before the first pitch and his debut as a major league manager, Carlos Mendoza had said, “The trumpets” when asked what he was most looking forward to in the opener. But that proved overly presumptuous and optimistic.
Like the Mets’ offense, the trumpets of “Narco” for the entrance of Edwin Diaz remained silent for another day. Instead, after the McNeil-Hoskins confrontation, the Mets went six up, six down. Abner Uribe, filling in for the injured All-Star closer Devin Williams, needed just 11 ninth-inning pitches to close out the Mets.
Oh yeah, Williams was drafted during the Stearns administration and Uribe was signed as an international amateur.
