Edgardo Alfonzo Deserved Better
Edgardo Alfonzo is one of the greatest Mets to ever wear the uniform. In fact, according to WAR, he’s the eighth best Met ever putting him ahead of beloved Mets like Keith Hernandez and Mike Piazza.
Even if you don’t subscribe to WAR, it’s hard to argue he’s the best second baseman in team history, and he’s one of the most beloved players to ever don a Mets uniform. That includes both fans and fellow players. We all loved and respected him.
T.J. Quinn of ESPN would note that saying Alfonzo “was practically a coach while he played, he was so respected by other players. ” They all believed he would one day manage, and starting in 2017, he would.
While things did not go well in his first year as a manager, Alfonzo did guide the Cyclones to consecutive seasons with a winning record. That included the Cyclones winning their first ever outright New-York Penn League title this year.
With the Mets having fired Mickey Callaway, you could make the argument Alfonzo should’ve been considered as a replacement. Alfonzo wouldn’t even get an interview. In fact, he’s out of a job all together.
As reported by Mike Puma of the New York Post, the reason provided was Brodie Van Wagenen wanted to hire his own guy to manage the Cyclones.
Did you ever think you’d see the day where the Mets said Alfonzo wasn’t one of their guys?
It’s embarrassing, and it gets worse when you consider it’s coming from the guy who gutted the farm system and brought in his old clients for a third place finish. Under Van Wagenen, the Mets are saying Robinson Cano and Jed Lowrie are their guys, but Alfonzo isn’t.
Now, the Mets are saying the only manager in their organization who went to the playoffs, let alone won a championship, isn’t one of their guys. The best second baseman in their history isn’t one of their guys. A person who has been a Met since he’s been 17 years old isn’t one of their guys.
Not only is this insulting, but it’s embarrassing for this organization. Alfonzo, the players, and the fans deserved better. That does double when you consider all the times the Wilpons interceded for Terry Collins.
Overall, there’s been nothing from the organization. Not a press release thanking him. As usual, both the Wilpons and Van Wagenen are ducking the media to avoid answering for their decision.
This is not how you treat an all-time great Met. It gets worse when you consider Alfonzo STILL isn’t in the Mets Hall of Fame. Top to bottom, the Mets organization should be ashamed of themselves.
Edgardo Alfonzo deserves much better than this.
I had forgotten Edgardo was done at age 28. He left the Mets, signed for more than he had made in his entire career, and was replacement level thereafter.
‘He wasn’t one of Brodie’s guys’ smells of a dysfunctional FO inventing bad excuses to cover bad reasons, particularly given the Wilpons would have reserved to themselves the right to overrule their GM in a matter like this. That conversation would go,
–I’d like to not keep Alfonso.
–No, we’re keeping him.
–Okay.
That’s about how it would go. They’re also keeping him as some sort of ambassador, so it doesn’t sound like they want to part ways. Who knows with these guys. Not to give them undue credit, but maybe he wasn’t a good manager. Winning doesn’t mean you’re necessarily good at your job. Look at Art Howe in Oakland. Look at every clown who won the US presidency in the last 40 years.
Alfonzo was a good manager for Brooklyn.
Serious question: how do we know that, given winning isn’t much of a metric over a very short managerial career, particularly winning once in short season low A ball, and that winning 43 might look good but the team should have won 48?
The Cyclones underperformed by 1 game in 2019, by 5 games in 2018, and broke even in 2017. EA’s overall record from 2017-2019 was 107-109. What’s the metric showing Alfonzo’s value from the dugout, given the most obvious metric shows his teams underperformed?
Btw, the Cyclones in 2019 were an old team, older even than their A ball team in the Sallie league, the Fireflies.
At a level where age is a critical factor, the Cyclones appear to have been the oldest team in their league. They had the oldest hitters, and only the Yankees’ affiliate had older pitching, by 0.1 years, on average. Yeah, unless there’s some concrete reason elsewhere to believe Alfonzo had something going on, there isn’t anything impressive about his record.
And for an MLB team that’s ostensibly relying on its talent in the low minors, the Mets lower minors’ teams (ie not AA and AAA) went 294-308 in 2019. That’s really bad.
Two things here:
1. You’re putting way too much stock into win/loss record for minor leaguers.
2. The Mets didn’t have a good year on the player development front at some levels, but that is reflected in player progress, not the ages.
@metsdaddy –
1. no, what I’m actually doing is giving your claim the benefit of the doubt and trying to see if there any facts that would support it–since you offered none. Since you continue to offer none despite my research on your behalf, let’s call this one closed.
2. that one is murky, at best.
There’s zero correlation between minor league win/loss records and success of prospects at the Major League level.
There’s zero study of research which supports this.