Paul Articulates - Who's next?

The Mets pretty much cleaned house with their coaching staff at the end of the 2025 season, in a way scapegoating them for the lack of performance.  Carlos Mendoza was given a pass into next year, and it is yet to be seen what players are moved to different zip codes.

Some of the coaches had received great praise in prior seasons – Jeremy Hefner and Eric Chavez among them.  But in the big money world of professional baseball, the “What have you done for me lately?” mantra always prevails.

So let’s talk about the now open coaching positions and determine what the desired qualities are before the interviews begin.

Pitching Coach: Hefner was hired as the Mets pitching coach for the 2020 season so it has been six full seasons since changing leadership there.  There has been some very significant evolution in pitcher development since then, as the Mets have added the pitching lab and a whole team of analytics folks.  So the new pitching coach is going to have to understand the technology and be very capable of translating the vast amount of data into action plans for the pitchers.  

There are a few “hot” names out there like J.P. Martinez of the San Francisco Giants and Connor McGuinness of the Dodgers, but the guy that may understand the most about the Mets’ technology and players may be the current assistant pitching coach Desi Druschel.  Desi was with the Yankees during Carlos Mendoza’s days there and has spent the past season learning the Mets’ system.  

Another name to consider is Daniel McKinney, who has been the pitching coach with the Brooklyn Cyclones and the Binghamton Rumble Ponies in the last few years grooming the likes of Nolan McLean, Jonah Tong, and Brandon Sproat.

Hitting Coach: Eric Chavez was a star in the Mets’ 2022 season when clutch hitting was rampant.  He did so well that year that he was promoted to bench coach in 2023 and the hitting immediately tanked.  He was moved back to the hitting coach position in 2024 and after a tough start, the team played some more clutch ball in their late season surge.  One would think he had the equation for Mets’ hitting success, but this year changed people’s minds.  I will miss him as I missed Kevin Long when he left after the 2017 season.  

But now it is time for someone that can restore some fundamental hitting rules like putting the ball in play and moving runners on base.  This may be difficult to find in the “two true outcome” era, but there are clues.  Look at what Milwaukee did this season under hitting coach Al LeBoeuf.  They had the fifth lowest strike-out total and the third most hits in MLB.  

Does that translate to runs scored?  Yes it does – the Brewers’ 806 runs only trailed the Yankees and Dodgers this year and those teams were dominated by big money stars.  LeBoeuf had two assistants this year helping with the approach, Connor Dawson and Eric Theisen.

Special Catching Coach:  Usually a team has a bullpen coach that supports the catchers on the team, but the Mets hired a special coach in Glenn Sherlock to help with the development of Francisco Alvarez.  Since Alvarez regressed twice in his defensive skills over the past two years, Sherlock was not given a third strike.  

Now the Mets are going to look for someone to coach the finer points of defensive catching.  With the robo-umps creeping into MLB, there will be much less emphasis on framing pitches and a return to the art of blocking balls and throwing out runners attempting to steal.  A few retired catchers who were extremely good at that may be in the running: Yadier Molina, Pudge Rodriquez, or Brian Schneider?

Third Base Coach: Mike Sarbaugh was not aggressive enough with the Mets’ runners this year.  I’m not expecting an all-out risk taker, but when the hitting with RISP is as bad as it was this year, any runner with a chance of scoring should be taking that chance.  

The most aggressive third base coach in recent Mets’ history was Gary Disarcina, who held the position during the 2019 through 2021 seasons.  Gary retired from professional baseball in early 2024, but maybe he can be coaxed back.  If not, does Antoan Richardson have a brother?

Bench Coach: With John Gibbons leaving, who is going to be the trusted advisor for Carlos Mendoza?  Maybe another Carlos (Beltran)?  There are several prominent coaches around the league that will toss their hat into the ring, but I would like to see a promotion from within.  

Someone like Reid Brignac, who has coached the AA Binghamton Rumble Ponies to two championship series berths in four years (won the EL Championship in 2025) would be a great add.  He knows all the young players and has some idea how to motivate them based upon his success at the AA level.