Profiling the modus operandi of Mets owner Steve Cohen

Steve Cohen isn’t spending billions of dollars to build a winning baseball club. It’s not a practical thing for him to do. The owner of the New York Mets needs to operate in a different sort of way.

If you watch enough true crime series or detective shows, you’ll be familiar with the term modus operandi. Often abbreviated as “M.O.”, it’s a description of how one operates. There’s a theme and some predictability.

Cohen has a few things about him as the owner of the Mets that fall into his modus operandi. Let’s put on our goofy Sherlock Holmes hats and investigate.

1) NY Mets owner Steve Cohen likes to grab headlines

Cohen definitely likes the flashy signings. This comes as no surprise. It was the expectation the moment we found out the Wilpons were kicking themselves to the curb. Cohen is a larger than life figure in the financial world. He’s that way in baseball.

The biggest headlines he has grabbed as owner have been the signings of Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander almost exactly a year apart. They were the biggest moves he could possibly make. They’re ones Mets fans will remember forever.

Who doesn’t remember where they were when Cohen changed the game and signed Scherzer? When Verlander joined him, we will forever recall what we ate for lunch that day. These were the kind of headline-grabbing additions that years from now, even after an apocalypse, would be found in the form of cave drawings on the walls of the home locker room of Citi Field.

One other notable headline grab by Cohen was the record-breaking extension for Edwin Diaz. Cohen’s money isn’t getting thrown around like crazy. What it’s doing is landing on the back pages for the best of reasons.

3) NY Mets owner Steve Cohen is reactionary in the best way

Vengeful is one way to put it. When the Mets had Steven Matz changing his mind and choosing the St. Louis Cardinals instead of reuniting with them, Cohen went on a Twitter rant of epic proportions about professionalism. He called out Matz’s agent. Days later, his ball club signed Scherzer.

This part of Cohen’s M.O. repeated in December 2022. Jacob deGrom going to the Texas Rangers had Cohen looking for a replacement. It turned out to be Verlander.

Being reactionary has its benefits. Proactivity is personally preferred. In some cases you need to react instead.

The fans become the beneficiary of this personality trait. Cohen has twice now reacted almost immediately to losing by going out and doing something bigger. Is Verlander better than deGrom? It’s debatable because they are two very different pitchers at this point of their career with retirement much closer for one. We can also ponder if the recent signing of Nimmo and David Robertson within minutes of each other was Cohen reacting to deGrom's introduction in Texas. It seems like too big of a coincidence to ignore.

What we can agree on is that Cohen greenlit a move we’ll remember forever. It may have never happened if not for his reactionary nature.

Cohen does seem to have the mind of a planner. When those plans hit the fan, he has his executives get aggressive and attack. Mets fans may still feel the sting of losing deGrom. Knowing Cohen has everyone’s back and is willing to make a massive payment will help fans rest easy.