Two weeks ago, this wasn't a storyline. The Mets fired Carlos Mendoza in late June with the team sitting at 34-47, fresh off a six-game losing streak that included a doubleheader sweep in Chicago where the nightcap alone produced six errors. Front office exec Andy Green, a former big league infielder who'd been running player development since 2023, got the interim tag. President of baseball ops David Stearns was clear at the time: Green would finish out the year and then go right back to his desk job. No audition, no path to permanent. That's the official line, anyway.
Except the Mets have played better under Green, and now the guy who runs one of the most-listened-to baseball podcasts in the country won't let the question die. Jon Heyman has spent the better part of a week teasing his sitdown with Green, and the framing keeps circling back to the same thing: could this actually turn permanent.
Mets interim manager Andy Green touches here on “The Show” on whether he could keep the job fulltime (and later expands on it in full interview). Green also hits on positives he sees YouTube: https://t.co/l46WAsuGDX Apple: https://t.co/wfm8ryWSWb Spotify: https://t.co/WO6Rb3KNLj https://t.co/UlEYnmD4df
It's worth remembering how rare this is. The last time the Mets swapped managers mid-season was Willie Randolph getting let go in May 2008 — nearly two decades of stability broken in one Friday morning move. That context is exactly why a fired-then-hot dynamic is catching attention: teams that make these switches almost never flip the interim tag into the real job unless the on-field results make it impossible to ignore.
Heyman's pod rollout has treated the Green conversation like the main event, not a throwaway clip. One promo dug into Green discussing the Mets' younger players and how he's handled a lineup anchored by Juan Soto, while another framed it as a direct question about his own future in the dugout.
Interim Mets manager Andy Green talks here about the transition to NY. Green, whose Mets are playing spirited ball now, discusses whether he may end up staying in the job in full pod YouTube: https://t.co/l46WAsuGDX Apple: https://t.co/wfm8ryWSWb Spotify: https://t.co/WO6Rb3KNLj https://t.co/gklW1x0JHG
None of this means Stearns is walking back what he said in June. Front offices say a lot of things about interim managers that don't survive a winning streak, and the Mets front office has every incentive to run a real search this winter regardless of how the next few months go. But the fact that Heyman keeps circling back to the fulltime question, pod after pod, tells you the industry doesn't view this as settled. Green's answers so far have been careful — coach-speak about focusing on today, not the job title. That's the answer every interim manager gives right up until it isn't true anymore.
Watch what happens if the Mets keep playing this way into August. A front office can say 'he's returning to development' in June and mean it. It's a lot harder to say it in October if the alternative is handing a winning clubhouse to a stranger.