Less than a week after Vice President-elect Kamala Harris became the first woman to ever be on a winning national election ticket, another gender glass ceiling was broken when the Miami Marlins named Kim Ng to be their general manager.
Kim Ng has long been on the radar screen of many baseball teams as she has served as an assistant general manager for both the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees. Marlins chief executive officer Derek Jeter knew her from his days playing shortstop in the Bronx and was obviously impressed.
Her love of baseball dates back to her adolescence in Fresh Meadows where she loved playing stickball and watching the woeful Mets circa 1980.
Ng may be baseball’s first female GM but she is the second to have ties to Fresh Meadows. That honor goes to Jon Daniels who has served in that capacity for the Texas Rangers for the past fifteen years.
Marcus Stroman used Steve Cohen’s purchase of the New York Mets as the reason for accepting the team’s one year $18.9 million which delays his free agency until after the 2021 season.
That’s great spin but Stroman would have been crazy to test the free agency waters in a time when the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting everyone’s economic decision-making especially for a pitcher who opted out of playing in 2020 because of COVID concerns. Stroman is a Duke grad so you know he’s a sharp guy. It’s safe to say he would have stayed with the Mets even if the Wilpons hadn’t sold the team.
Stroman’s qualifying contract offer will go down as the last transaction to take place under the old Mets regime and it may very well have been the reason Sandy Alderson fired Brodie Van Wagenen as the team’s general manager less than two hours after Steve Cohen officially took control.
Marcus Stroman may not be the only Mets pitcher from Suffolk County in 2021. The team recently claimed veteran Nick Tropeano on waivers from the Pittsburgh Pirates. Tropeano is a SUNY Stony Brook alum.
To borrow a line from the 1980 film, “The Blues Brothers,” Mets owner Steve Cohen is putting the band back together when it comes to assembling Mets executives.
Even before the sale was official Cohen had named Sandy Alderson to be the new team president. Alderson had served as the Mets GM from 2011 through 2018.
Rejoining the Mets as the team’s senior vice president of communications is David Newman who held that position from 2005 through 2018. I’ve always found him to be someone who treats smaller media outlets with the same respect as larger ones.
My guess is former Mets chief operating officer Jeff Wilpon chased away both Alderson and Newman. It’s good to have them back from exile.
CBS had to clear out its Sunday 1 PM inventory of NFL games in order to telecast the most famous golf tournament of them all, the Masters. Given their lowly status in the standings it seems almost comical to mention this but that’s why the New York Jets had a scheduled bye this past Sunday.
CBS Sports CEO Sean McManus once told me the Jets were a chronic ratings underperformer even during seasons for better than this for them. Nonetheless, Gang Green does play in the nation’s biggest market and CBS wasn’t about to forego the advertising revenue which comes along with that fact.
I normally don’t comment on elections but it sure appears the Florida Democratic Party has become the New York Jets of politics.
Photo: Larry Goren/Icon Sportswire