Mets’ David Stearns announces return of entire coaching staff

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

That’s the mentality of New York Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns, who announced on Monday that the entire coaching staff will return for the 2025 season. This includes manager Carlos Mendoza, bench coach John Gibbons, co-hitting coaches Jeremy Barnes and Eric Chavez, and pitching coach Jeremy Hefner.

“These guys have done a really good job and are very deserving of coming back,” Stearns said of the Mets’ coaching staff.

Hefner, Chavez, Jeremy Barnes, strategy coach Danny Barnes and catching instructor Glenn Sherlock are the only five members of the staff who served under Buck Showalter’s previous regime; his firing after the 2023 season led to the hiring of Mendoza, a strong candidate for NL Manager of the Year.

Of the Mets’ coaches, pitching coach Hefner is the longest-tenured member, having been with the team since 2020; he has served under three different managers in five seasons, namely Luis Rojas, Showalter and Mendoza.

In addition to the aforementioned holdovers, the rest of the Mets’ first-year coaches will also return. Bench coach Gibbons, first base coach Antoan Richardson, third base coach Mike Sarbaugh and bullpen coach Jose Rosado were all in their first seasons in the Mets organization (although Gibbons spent his entire short playing career with them and was the bullpen catcher was for the 1986 championship team).

The roster likely won’t suffer the same fate as the coaching staff, as the team had a magical run all the way to the NLCS; combined with plenty of money coming off the books, the Mets are in a great position to make significant player upgrades. Nevertheless, the deep postseason run was the reason behind Stearns’ decision to retain all of the Mets’ coaches, who are rewarded for all their hard work.