If David Stearns makes the trip to Queens and sits in an executive suite, the question hanging over the Mets season would literally be watching them from above.
Stearns and the Mets could see each other this week.
As the Brewers visit Citi Field for the only time this season in a series beginning Tuesday, it will be the first time the Mets have seen the outfit that the president of Milwaukee baseball operations has assembled about eight months after the Brewers failed. did not allow Stearns to interview with the Mets.
The 34-28 Brewers are once again in contention for an NL Central title and are targeting a fifth consecutive playoff appearance at the top-flight pitcher’s back – a rotation led by Corbin Burnes and a bullpen led by Josh Hader – with a payroll that Spotrac pegs as 18th highest in MLB.
Stearns helped build a consistent threat, which led to the Mets requesting an interview last offseason while looking for a president of baseball operations. Milwaukee owner Mark Attanasio, who hired Stearns as general manager in September 2015, denied the request.
The Mets’ long, interview-filled search ended without the position being filled. Instead, Steve Cohen and Sandy Alderson pivoted in mid-November to hire Billy Eppler as general manager — not president of baseball operations. Eppler was the National League’s best team in ¹/₂ 2 months, but there’s still a chance the Mets could add a position above him next offseason.
“There will be at least a year of trail for this [GM] to demonstrate their ability and potential,” Alderson said a week before hiring Eppler. “I’ve said it to others in the past, this is the opportunity. That’s all you can ask for. And demonstrated ability tends to be rewarded.
Eppler has done well with a job that surely looks better than last winter, when the Mets constantly tried to attract top talent to their front office.
Stearns, the Post’s Jon Heyman reported, has an opt-out in his contract if he goes far in the playoffs.
There is a belief that the New York native is interested in the Mets’ best baseball work, Heyman reported. Stearns grew up as a Mets fan and even interned for the team in 2008.
