The Show: A NY Post baseball podcast with Joel Sherman & Jon Heyman · NYPost

Who Is Most To Blame For Mets Historic Collapse? w/ Mike Puma & Mike Vaccaro

·54 min·3 clips

Joel Sherman says the Mets’ collapse is “David Stearns’ mess” and attacks the front-office philosophy.

1. The Show: A NY Post baseball podcast with Joel Sherman & Jon Heyman centers on the Mets’ 2025 collapse and the Yankees’ playoff opener against the Red Sox. 2. Joel Sherman and Jon Heyman host Mike Puma, the Post Mets beat writer, and Mike Vaccaro, the Post general columnist who knows Mets history, to explain why the season unraveled. 3. The episode asks whether David Stearns, Steve Cohen, Pete Alonso, and Edwin Díaz define the Mets’ next step after the historic miss. 4. Puma says he thought the Mets were a 90-win team after adding Juan Soto, re-signing Pete Alonso, and improving pitching. 5. Vaccaro says he projected 85 wins and thought the Mets were thin on arms, especially after trusting too much in the pitching lab. 6. Both guests point to a club that looked strong for 60 to 70 games and then nosedived in September. 7. Puma cites the Mets going 0-17 in games where they trailed after eight innings. 8. Vaccaro says the late-season roster relied on three rookies who were not on the roster by August 1. 9. Sherman says the season became “David Stearns’ mess” because the expensive stars worked better than the supporting moves. 10. Sherman points to rotating third basemen, missed pitching depth, and weak defense as the failed parts of the plan. 11. Puma names Kodai Senga, David Peterson, and Sean Manaea as the three pitchers most tied to the collapse. 12. He says Senga was not the same after a hamstring injury and Peterson’s first-half form disappeared in August. 13. He also says Manaea returned from an oblique injury but never looked like last year’s ace again. 14. Vaccaro says Manaea’s struggles in the fourth and fifth innings bled into the rest of the staff. 15. The conversation shifts to Pete Alonso, whose defense, offense, and popularity make him a difficult test for Steve Cohen and David Stearns. 16. Sherman argues that Alonso is the most popular Met since Tom Seaver and says a return would mean accepting a poor defensive team. 17. The hosts also treat Edwin Díaz’s opt-out as a first real test of whether Stearns will leave his comfort zone for a reliever in his 30s. 18. A parallel Yankees discussion tracks Aaron Judge’s postseason pressure, his likely third AL MVP, and the case for Cal Raleigh. 19. The tone is blunt, argumentative, and stat-heavy, with Joel Sherman pressing ownership and roster questions while the guests answer in long, detailed stretches. 20. Mets fans who want front-office accountability and Yankees fans following Judge’s postseason should listen; listeners avoiding roster politics and MVP debates can skip.

As heard by us

A sharp Mets postmortem that widens into New York baseball debate.

The episode keeps its focus on the Mets meltdown and the question of who deserves the blame. With Mike Puma and Mike Vaccaro in the mix, it moves through the present failures, the futures for Pete Alonso and Edwin Diaz, and the larger issue of whether David Stearns can be…

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Want the Mets meltdown unpacked by people who know the room?

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