The New York Mets are expected to announce that they’ve selected Terry Collins as their new manager, signing him to a two-year contract. Collins was selected after weeks of searching, and beat out names like Bob Melvin, Wally Backman and Chip Hale.
The Mets had accumulated a long list of managerial candidates, each with something different to bring to the table, but the Mets feel Collins is the best choice to restore the Mets to relevance, and dare I say it, playoff contention.
So now that Mets fans have a body at the helm, what should they feel?
Nothing.
With each name mentioned as a possible manager, fans and writers made their own choices. Backman had the vote from fans. Hale had the players themselves and Melvin had the writers. But in the end, none of it mattered. The reason? Collins had Mets VP Paul DePodesta championing his name throughout the halls of Citi Field, all but ensuring he’d be selected.
The predominant school of thought surrounding the Mets is that all they need is a fiery, in-your-face manager to get them moving in the right direction. Well, now the Mets have that manager in Collins, so now we play the waiting game.
Fans now have to wait and see if that’s really all the Mets needed this whole time. I, on the other hand, don’t think it’s all the Mets need, and that is why I am neither excited nor disappointed with the selection of Collins as the new Mets manager.
Collins has repeatedly shown he is unable to manage with any consistent success. His failure to control the clubhouse during stints in Houston and Anaheim show that maybe a strong voice isn’t always the best thing. Yet another failed managerial gig in Japan, which Collins blamed on an inability to adjust to the differences in the game, shows inflexibility.
When asked about Collins, Larry Bowa, who worked with Collins when he managed the Angels, said, “Terry will not be afraid to step on toes.” Collins may want to watch where he steps in the Mets clubhouse though, because there are some big egos walking around. It’s not hard to imagine rifts between Collins and guys like Carlos Beltran and Francisco Rodriguez during the grind of a 162-game season.
Maybe I’m being a cynical Mets fan, and the disappointments that go along with being a Mets fan have finally poisoned me beyond the use of a vaccine. If Wally Backman had been chosen as manager, fans everywhere would be doing backflips. The Wilpons and GM Sandy Alderson are surely aware of this fact, yet they chose Collins. So either they don’t care about what the fans want and made a pure baseball decision, or Collins really does bring something to the Mets that they want.
Honestly, I’d take a dog for a manager if it would mean a winning season and some October baseball. But Collins doesn’t elicit any strong feelings with the fans. We don’t feel anything. Well, maybe skepticism.
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