A former NY Mets player WFAN’s Evan Roberts wants to replace Keith Hernandez one day

WFAN host Evan Roberts discussed several points about the New York Mets on one of his latest podcast episodes. The podcast known simply as Rico Brogna in honor of the one-time Mets first baseman covers some of the more in-depth fan-focused elements of the Mets.

On his February 4th episode titled The Rico 10, Roberts reviewed, you’ll never believe it, 10 different Mets topics. Included was a mention of how Keith Hernandez is back on the SNY broadcast.

The catchup episode of “The Rico” quietly had one of Roberts’ more fun declarations in a show about a lot of players, transactions, and offseason jargon. Understanding full well that Hernandez and colleague Ron Darling are probably nearing the end of their career, he proposed the Mets steal one last member of the New York Yankees organization to one day replace whichever of the two retires first.

Welcome back to Queens, David Cone

This wasn’t a prediction. It wasn’t any inside information. It was just a wise thought about what’s next for the Mets broadcasting future. Roberts put two and two together then doubled it to get 44, the number Cone wore for most of his Mets tenure.

If you’re going to replace Hernandez or Darling, you might as well do it with a well-respected and fully capable ex-player. Cone first began working as a color commentator for the YES Network back in 2001 prior to a comeback. The Mets offered him a job on the broadcasting team after his retirement from baseball, but he declined due to family reasons.

He has been with the Yankees off and on since 2008, leaving shortly after his time in the broadcast booth began, once again, for family reasons. If you’ve watched Cone, you can understand why he would fit in well with the Mets broadcast. The fact that he’s an ex-Met who played alongside Hernandez and Darling briefly doesn’t hurt either.

More likely, with Hernandez being almost a decade older than Darling, he’d be the one to retire from broadcasting first. In which case, a booth of Cone, Darling, and Gary Cohen is an example of what we could see a few years from now. Cone and Cohen? New Mets fans won’t know what to think!

Cone is expected to call around 60 Yankees games this year which is less than what Hernandez will sit in on for the Mets, 95. Cone doesn’t seem like a natural long-term plan in the SNY booth, but maybe a stop gap for a couple of years post-Hernandez with home games and maybe a few close proximity road ones in the works.

No exit plan is known for Hernandez or Darling. Both remain important parts of the Mets gameday experience.

Cone to the Mets booth isn’t exactly as Tom Seaver calling Yankees games. Of the other options, former Mets like Daniel Murphy, Curtis Granderson, and Todd Zeile seem to be good candidates to one day enter the booth on a permanent basis. 

In the meantime, let’s enjoy however many games we get out of GKR before it becomes GRD or GKD.