An Open Letter to the Wilpons: Please Sell the Mets

I was 7-years old in 1969, when the underdog NY Mets won the first—of their only two—World Series. At the time, the owner of the NY Mets was Joan W. Payson.

Ownership changed hands for the first time in the club’s history in 1980, when Nelson Doubleday purchased the controlling interest of the Mets. His partner was Fred Wilpon, Chairman of the Board of Sterling Equities, Inc. They bought the Mets for a then record-setting $21 million. Because this was smack in the middle of “the lean years”, each year more difficult to be a Met-fan than the previous year, I felt a shot of hope for my team to at least be competitive throughout October. Their front offices often touted plans for long-term rebuilding. They often even borrowed from their predecessor’s (Brooklyn Dodgers) tagline of, “Wait ‘till next year!” on a few occasions, which I thought was pathetic at the time.

Finally, the team made good on it’s promises, and by 1985, put together a pretty exciting team—culminating with their only other World Series Championship in 1986, with their legendary victory over the Boston Red Sox. That year, at age 24, I knew that we finally, really….had something special. I also learned at that relatively young age, of the importance of what I believe is a pretty obscure x-factor in sports teams—Chemistry. That 1986 team was not just loaded with unbelievable talent, but you could tell that they were truly having fun because of, in large part, their chemistry. Everybody contributed not just their talent, but their off-the-field antics were equally as entertaining. A pitching staff boasting the likes of Dwight Gooden, Sid Fernandez, Ron Darling, Bob Ojeida, Roger McDowell and Jesse Orosco, and the unbelievably productive offensive line-up of Lenny Dykstra, Wally Backman, Keith Hernandez, Darryl Strawberry, Gary Carter, Ray Knight, Kevin Mitchell, Mookie Wilson… just to name a few. Life as a Met-fan was good.

Sadly, I vividly remember one thing Mookie Wilson proudly asserted while standing at the podium at City Hall on the day of their parade through the Canyon of Heroes: “Nineteen eighty-six….year of the Mets! Nineteen eighty-seven…. year of the Mets! Nineteen eighty-eight….year of the Mets!” The crowds roared louder with each statement.

That very off-season—for some God-forsaken reason—the Mets front offices just as quickly dismantled this clearly dynasty caliber group of guys, rendering Mookie’s words from prophetic to irrelevant. One can understand the GM getting ready to consider dealing for the older, veteran players like Ray Knight, and perhaps even Keith Hernandez and Gary Carter. And they did deal for Knight. BUT… they also dealt away Kevin Mitchell for Kevin McReynolds, they could have just dealt with the platoon situation of Lenny Dykstra and Mookie Wilson in center-field, but they actually got rid of BOTH of these guys. Their ‘table-setters’, who were as distracting  as base-runners as they were intimidating at the plate, were now gone, and Juan Samuel was acquired in return. The next season, Darryl Strawberry and Dwight Gooden were traded, and the following season, unbelievably… guys like David Cone were simply allowed “to walk”. They didn’t get anything for him (yes, Jeff Kent and players to be named later, but they were post-trade acquisitions—and all busts). I have never quite gotten over this sad, transparent attempt for Mets executives to justify their salaries in a pathetic attempt to appear as ‘movers and shakers’ by reinventing the wheel in their own name(s). There was just no reason to engage in all of this moving and shaking, or reinventing the wheel. But they did, and it wasn’t long until those wheels fell off.

In 2002, Fred Wilpon and his Sterling Equities partners bought out Nelson Doubleday’s 50-percent of the team and became the sole owners of the Mets. It was not a stretch to call this era “the lean years II”, but I was thinking that maybe now would be a good time to do some moving and shaking.  I never really cared for Fred Wilpon, but as the devout Met-fan I was at the time, I silently offered him the benefit of the doubt in hopes of being proven wrong. It’s now 2015, and I have been vying for the Wilpons to sell the Mets since about 2006. For years, I felt like a voice in the wilderness, but suddenly, I am finally hearing a clamoring among Met-fans everywhere, for the Wilpons to please sell—thank God.

I’m no accountant. I would not want to be so arrogant as to suggest I could counsel the Wilpons and Sterling Equities who clearly are more successful business people than I am. But one doesn’t need to be an accountant to learn that—Major League Baseball has 30 teams in it’s ranks. I just Googled “List of Major League Baseball Payrolls”. The web page I landed on, only showed the top 16 teams, and I didn’t see the Mets. I realized I needed to keep scrolling down further. Then I had to scroll down again—further. The NY Mets place twenty-second (22nd) out of thirty MLB teams. The Mets are not a small-market team. At the time of their only change of ownership, (for the THEN record-setting acquisition of $21 million), the Mets were only 2nd to the NY Yankees in markets, and value. They recently built a brand new stadium, Citi-Field, but largely somehow, via NY State taxpayer dollars.

I’m not educated enough to know what provisions are in place, if any—for MLB team owners to be deposed or admonished, sans any breach of MLB ethics, such as what happened with George Steinbrenner in 1990. I have heard rumors of MLB Commissioners discretionary authority to initiate movement or sanctions among it’s Franchise’s owners, but again, I am ignorant as to what channels exist, or if this is even possible. I just really wish it were. I am now relegated to rooting for a uniform, than a franchise. They’re killing me. It’s at the point for me now where, were the Wilpons to finally cave to the pressure of the increasingly loud clamors of the throngs of Met faithful by doing some moving and shaking now, I’ve lost complete trust in the Coupons, er -uh… the Wilpons. They bought the Mets in 1980. It has been… 35 years after all. They’ve ‘moved and shaken’ when they should not have, and have not when they should.