A friend suggests “LFGM” now stands for Let’s Find a General Manager. Implicit therein is let’s find a general manager who isn’t as apparently icky as the Mets GM whose stay in the job was brief and whose sudden dismissal from it became fait accompli once certain absolutely damning facts came to light.
On Monday night, ESPN reported that in 2016, Jared Porter, then working in the Cubs front office, had sent a barrage of harassing, explicit texts [1] (lewd photos included) to a female reporter from outside the US attempting to cover baseball, a.k.a. do her job. According to the story by Mina Kimes and Jeff Passan, the reporter left sports media in part because of Porter’s actions. While she tried to cover the game, she felt it necessary to avoid the man who was disturbingly slow to take a hint and leave her be. “I started to ask myself, ‘Why do I have to put myself through these situations to earn a living?’” the now former journalist explained.
Porter confirmed his actions to ESPN, which had been putting together a story about the texts as far back as 2017 but relented in deference to Porter’s target’s concern that “her career would be harmed if the story emerged”. Porter’s career as Mets GM ended within twelve hours of ESPN’s report. This morning Steve Cohen tweeted [2] the executive brought on board in December had just been “terminated,” citing “the importance of integrity” and emphasizing “zero tolerance for this type of behavior”.
What the Mets lacked in vetting when they hired the highly recommended [3] Porter they made up for in decisiveness when they let him go…not that there was much of a decision to be made. What Porter copped to doing was disgusting and, given his own admission, not in dispute. Clever baseball mind [4] or not, you can’t present him to the public as one of the faces of your organization. You certainly can’t implicitly sanction what he did by keeping him around.
Who will be the next general manager? Somebody who doesn’t do stuff like this would be a good baseline qualification.