Sandy Alderson Named MLB Executive of the Year

Yeah, I never thought I would be typing that headline, either. But Sandy Alderson has indeed being named Baseball America’s Major League Executive of the Year. And he absolutely deserves it.

Alderson stayed true to his plan despite yelling from all sides to do more (including this side) to improve the Mets over the five years of his reign. And when the Mets were finally in contention in late July, Alderson went out and pulled off several major deals.

First was the trade for Juan Uribe and Kelly Johnson. He also added key bullpen parts in Tyler Clippard and Addison Reed. And of course, the big one, the one that really put the Mets over the top — Yoenis Cespedes. And Alderson did not have to deal any of the young pitchers or key minor league position players to land any of them. The only player of any real note is Michael Fulmer, and his place in the rotation was obviously blocked, so he was expendable.

Alderson thinks he has set the Mets up for the foreseeable future.

“Well, we hope it’s sustainable,” Alderson told Adam Rubin, writing for Baseball America for some reason. “You never know from year to year. We certainly have the strength of our team in starting pitching, which ought to be with us for some period of time. We’ve always had discipline over the five years that I’ve been here. I suspect we will continue to have some discipline in how we make decisions.

“At the same time, we’re at a higher level now. We do believe we can sustain this over a period of time. And now we have to go out and prove it, which is the difficult part.”

Sandy Alderson faces either a difficult or an easy winter. He knows what the team needs to win. Now he just has to be able to go out and get it. If he can, expect to see the same headline a year from now.