The National League Division Series between the Philadelphia Phillies and Atlanta Braves begins Saturday at Truist Park.
Three teams from the National League East, the Phillies, Braves and Miami Marlins, made the postseason. The New York Mets, who ran the highest payroll in baseball history, was not one of them.
The Mets will be watching from home as they deal with their own drama in Queens.
Billy Eppler resigned from his position as Mets general manager on Thursday. In a statement released by the team, Eppler said he wanted new president of baseball operations David Stearns to have a “clean slate.”
It was later reported by the New York Post that Eppler resigned due to a league investigation on the team’s improper usage of the injured list.
While finding Eppler’s replacement probably isn’t a priority of Stearns — the Mets need to find a new manager to replace Buck Showalter — he could pluck a new GM from his former team.
Former Phillies GM Matt Klentak’s name was “floated around” as a possible candidate for the job, according to Mets beat writer Anthony DiComo of MLB.com on an MLB Network appearance.
“One name that was floated to me was Matt Klentak, the former Phillies GM, who has been working for the Brewers, so there is a Stearns connection there,” DiComo said.
Klentak stepped down as Phillies GM in October 2020 and reassigned to a position in business operations. He was hired as a special assistant in Stearns’ front office in Milwaukee in late January 2022. He oversaw the Brewers’ international scouting department that year and took on more responsibility with the major league club after Stearns announced he was stepping down from the president of baseball operations position in October 2022.
The Mets GM would serve as Stearns’ top assistant. It’s a similar setup to the current Phillies front office. Dave Dombrowski, the president of baseball operations, is the top decision maker. General manager Sam Fuld is the No. 2 executive in command.
Klentak reflected on his time with the Phillies in a chat with SABR in May.
“It ended up, it appears anyway, that it worked,” Klentak said. “It was all worth it. They’re hanging a National League pennant flag up there right now in part, and I’m certainly not going to take all the credit for it, but at least in part because of some of the things we did while I was there. And it just didn’t happen fast enough. And I hate to use that as a cop out, but sometimes, that’s what happens. These are baseball players and as much as we make projections and we have plans and we think it’s going to go a certain way, sometimes it doesn’t work that way.”
Must-read (or watch, or listen) Phillies content
- “Dancing on My Own” singer Calum Scott tells Dan Gelston of the Associated Press that he plans on traveling to Philadelphia to perform the song if the Phillies win the World Series.
- The latest episode of the “Phillies Therapy” podcast previews the NLDS and offers a very unique pitching plan for Game 1 against the Braves.
- Atlanta starter Max Fried and his availability for the series could be a huge factor.
- Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola dominated the Marlins’ lineup in the Wild Card series. Manager Skip Schumaker was in awe. Our own Tim Kelly has the story.
- Alex Coffey of the Philadelphia Inquirer writes about Bryson Stott’s rare first-pitch swing that led to the second postseason grand slam in Phillies history.
- Also from the Inquirer, Matt Breen writes about how José Alvarado began making necklaces for his teammates.
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