Mets fans will gladly join the Dark Side and begin their own Evil Empire

Ask any New York Mets fan and they would gladly join the Dark Side if it meant a championship.

There aren’t too many teams in sports more loathed than the New York Yankees. The Houston Astros have done a good job of becoming the villain in recent years, but nobody compares to the original Evil Empire Yankees. Soon, they may have company on the Dark Side with the New York Mets.

For most of the Wilpon years, the Mets haven’t been seen the bad guys. Unless they’re playing a team in the National League East or facing the Yankees, they’re pretty innocuous.

Well, things could change under Steve Cohen. The billionaire future owner of the Mets could help the franchise turn heel. I haven’t polled anyone, but I can guarantee just about everyone who roots for the Amazins would gladly put on a Stormtrooper outfit and hop on the Death Star piloted by Cohen.

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There’s a certain joy fans feel when they become enemy number one. It’s a rare feeling only a few franchises ever experience.

In the NFL, the New England Patriots have this reputation. Before them, it was the Dallas Cowboys.

The NBA has also had its share of constant villains. Beloved by their fan bases and hated by all others, recent dynasties like the Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Lakers have become almost universally hated by everyone outside of their hometown fans/outside-of-the-city frontrunner. Let’s also not forget any team LeBron James has played for. They’ve been just as evil.

The Mets haven’t had any sustained success to ever qualify as an enemy of the state. The 1969 team was loveable even to outsiders. They took down the big, bad Baltimore Orioles.

In the 1980s, their best teams were similar to the 1969 squad. Sure, the roster had drug-users and a few other unsavory characters. Nonetheless, they were a fun team to follow.

Individual Mets players have given fans a reason to dislike them. As an organization, there has yet to be a period when they were the bad guys everyone hated because they were jealous.

Eat your hearts out, baseball fans. The Mets are trading in their orange and blue for dark black. They’re not causing trouble, breaking the law, or offending anybody. They’re just going to do what every team should do: go all-in to win. In doing so, they will become villains in baseball.

It’s all good, though. Leagues need teams like the Mets to point their fingers at and say “That’s the bad guy.” In MLB, this is missing at times.

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In the coming seasons, the Mets will have a target on their back. At the same time, they’ll have a target on all of the best free agents available. Because of this, they have a chance to become one of the most hated organizations in sports and for all of the right reasons.