Brodie Van Wagenen, Mets agree to contract terms, source says
FILE - In this Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2018, file photo, New York Mets newly-signed third baseman Todd Frazier, left, poses for photographers with his agent, Brodie Van Wagenen, after the former New York Yankees third baseman signed with the Mets, in New York. A person familiar with the negotiations says the Mets and Van Wagenen are getting closer to completing a deal that would make the high-profile agent the team's next general manager. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens, File) Credit: AP/Kathy Willens
LOS ANGELES — Welcome to the Mets’ Brodie Van Wagenen era.
Van Wagenen — an agent for Jacob deGrom and others with the Mets and across baseball — and Mets chief operating officer Jeff Wilpon have agreed to terms on a deal to make Van Wagenen the club’s new general manager, a source said Sunday.
The parties haven’t put pen to paper yet, but there is nothing left to negotiate. The Mets will introduce Van Wagenen at a news conference at Citi Field this week, and with the World Series having ended Sunday night, it likely will be as soon as Tuesday.
Convincing Van Wagenen to move from co-head of CAA Baseball to a high-profile GM job is a bold, outside-the-box hire for the Mets, who cast a wide net after Sandy Alderson stepped away because of cancer four months ago.
The team narrowed the field to three finalists last week: Van Wagenen, Rays executive Chaim Bloom and former Brewers/Rangers GM Doug Melvin, who had interviews with Jeff Wilpon and principal owner Fred Wilpon.
Van Wagenen, 44, starts his new job with great familiarity with a significant portion of the Mets’ major-league roster — deGrom, Noah Syndergaard, Yoenis Cespedes, Brandon Nimmo, Todd Frazier and others are CAA clients — and little familiarity with many other aspects of being a GM. Having never worked in a baseball front office, Van Wagenen will have to learn other parts of the gig on the fly, relying in part on assistant GM John Ricco and special assistants Omar Minaya and J.P. Ricciardi.
As part of his new role, Van Wagenen will have to divest completely from CAA, which has been prepared in recent days for such a transition and doesn’t expect to lose clients as a result.
While not unprecedented, Van Wagenen switching sides from player representative to team management raised concerns for the MLB Players Association.
“To the extent that confidential information becomes less confidential, yes, that is a concern,” MLBPA executive director Tony Clark said at the World Series over the weekend. “How players are treated, information that’s being provided that could adversely affect a player that he may be aware of based on [a previous agent-player relationship], all of that is a concern.”
