NY Mets Scapegoats: 2 to fire without thinking, 1 to put on notice, 1 to question

Not yet eliminated, but in need of a miracle and maybe a catastrophe elsewhere, the New York Mets are staring at the real possibility of being done with baseball by Sunday afternoon. They held onto the NL East lead for a good chunk of the season. At minimum, they were going to climb into the playoffs as a Wild Card club.

Maybe not. The team isn’t playing with much life. A lack of energy and discipline has many fans bailing. It’s a good thing the two NFL teams are a combined 0-6. Otherwise, this ongoing Mets torture would dominate the backpages even more than it already should.

Missing the playoffs is unacceptable. And if the Mets fail to even reach the playoffs, someone needs to be held accountable. It won’t be David Stearns. The coaching staff, however, won’t be so safe.

The Mets should fire Eric Chavez and Jeremy Barnes

Offense hasn’t been the greatest shortcoming of the Mets this year. Most troubling from the bats has been the inconsistencies. They’ve gotten some big performances out of Juan Soto and Pete Alonso. Others have had acceptable years as well.

It shouldn’t be enough to save Eric Chavez and Jeremy Barnes from continuing on as hitting coaches. Employed by the previous regime and coaching staff, it’s time for a change.

Firing the hitting coaches is often the easiest way to scapegoat a bad performance. Any sort of an offensive outage often has the hitting coach getting fired with little warning. Not Chavez and Barnes. Barnes survived the 2023 season when things were looking bleak mid-year. Chavez went from bench coach back to hitting coach starting in 2024 after earning favor with fans in 2022 for how well the team did.

It hasn’t been complete misery with these two. Mark Vientos had his breakout year in 2024 under their guidance. Brett Baty, to a lesser extent, has had a solid 2025 campaign. But it did take him a while. Vientos regressed. Francisco Alvarez has yet to put together that world-crushing campaign with some injuries partly to blame.

The Mets missing the playoffs is huge. Moving on from the hitting coach duo should be a part of the restructuring. Big bops like the one from Alvarez on Tuesday will do little to help. He did better after coming back from Triple-A.