“Managers are very controlling. You look at the managers today and the ones that are ‘my way or the highway’ are very few. It’s a remnant of another generation. If an organization is worth its salt – why would you turn that company over to a middle manager? So the attitude (in Oakland) was, ‘We have a philosophy and we’re going to find a manager who is going to implement that philosophy. We’re not looking for someone to tell us how to run the team, or upon which theory it should be predicated. We already have that. We want someone who is going to implement it for us.’ That’s a very different approach.”

– Sandy Alderson to ESPN, via MetsBlog.com.

I’ve maintained all along that I won’t make any sweeping declarative statements on the Mets’ general-manager hunt and I’m not about to roll back on that now, but it’s hard not to get excited about Alderson based on this and just about everything else I’ve read about the guy.

This quote, in particular, makes me think about the way the Jenrry Mejia situation unfolded this spring, and reminds me that a strong general manager with a sense of priorities can and should overrule a field manager clamoring for short-sighted decisions in the name of middle-relief help.

Mets fans — in the MetsBlog comments section linked above and elsewhere — knock Alderson’s taste in managers because he hired Art Howe. But that neglects to consider that Howe, presumably hired by Alderson as a manager willing to implement his and then Billy Beane’s grand plan for the A’s, helped Oakland to three straight playoff berths and consecutive 100-win seasons before butting heads with Beane and fleeing for Flushing.

As Mets fans we hated watching Howe appear comatose at the helm of some truly awful clubs at Shea, but clearly he was, at least for a while, a capable company man in the middle-management role Alderson described.

Obviously philosophies related to reporters “years ago” are different than those employed actually running a team, and so it’s too soon to praise Alderson without evidence that, if hired, he practices what he preaches at the Mets’ helm. But just the suggestion of a top-down organization with a clear pecking order and a well-conceived, thoroughly implemented plan is enough to capture Mets’ fans imaginations after the last administration.

The most interesting guy who played first for the Mets in their full-season minor leagues in 2010? Nick Evans. Yeah, that’s a long way from being The Most Interesting Man in the World, but it’s a start. Evans beat up AA pitching at a .294/.366/.527 rate and kept going in AAA where hit hit .314/.385/.557. Along the way, he totalled 44 doubles and 23 home runs in 125 minor league games. He even hit a little bit in the big leagues this time through, going .306/.324/.472 in 36 AB. He’s always hit lefties much better than righties and could well be a cheap bench piece next year who could play a little first, left or third in a dire emergency.

And that’s the weird part of Evans’ whole season. The Mets did not prepare him for a utility role. He played 12 games at third in AA and four in AAA, and just two in the outfield. Early on, the idea was that playing Evans at the same position everyday would help him get comfortable. At some point, like when he was crushing the ball, he should have played more third and more left to put himself in a position to help the big league club.

– Toby Hyde, MetsMinorLeagueBlog.com.

One of the less-heralded baffling decisions among the many made by the last administration in Flushing was not letting Evans regularly play the outfield in the Minors this season, even though he reportedly requested time there. It will be interesting to see how the next front office handles the oft-forgotten Evans, who has nothing to prove in the Minors and no options remaining on his contract.

Since Evans mashes lefties — including in his small 121 at-bat Major League sample — and offers some defensive flexibility, it seems like a no-brainer to keep him around in the righty bench bat role once filled by Fernando Tatis.

Since left field and third base will be filled by right-handers and right field will likely be manned by a switch-hitter, there probably won’t be a ton of chances for Evans until someone gets hurt. As Duke suggested in the comments section yesterday, Evans could probably combine with Lucas Duda to create a reasonable-hitting corner outfield platoon, though that could be a bit frightening defensively.

That’s really all I have to say about Nick Evans, I guess. Slow day in Metsland. Basically, the dude is too good, too young, and too inexpensive to be passed through waivers, and it will be a pretty damning indictment of the next GM if he or she goes out and spends a couple million on a righty bench bat only to cast Evans aside.