Ron Darling unloads on Mets coaching staff: ‘Someone should rip someone at some point’

If you’re fed up with the New York Mets, Ron Darling might be even more.

The former Mets starting pitcher turned SportsNet New York (SNY) analyst didn’t hold back Tuesday night as New York dropped its fifth consecutive game and fell to a season-high 11 games under .500 against the Cincinnati Reds. The specific moment that set him off was David Peterson failing to back up home plate on an errant throw from Bo Bichette, allowing Tyler Stephenson to take an extra base on a double.

In the context of a game the Mets were already losing 6-0, the play had no bearing on the outcome. That wasn’t the point.  To Darling, a member of the 1986 World Series championship team who has spent nearly two decades watching this franchise from the SNY booth, it was one more symptom of a disease that has been spreading all season.

“That really tells me that coaches really don’t have as much influence on the players as they think they have,” he said, “because someone should rip someone at some point, but they don’t because they don’t want to upset anyone. You have to back up bases every single time.”

Gary Cohen asked his partner whether the play would be addressed after the game.

“It might, it might be, but not addressed the way it should be addressed, because if it was addressed, Gary, it wouldn’t happen,” Darling answered. “It happens every game. We just don’t point it out.”

Mendoza, for his part, was asked about Peterson after the game and acknowledged it was unacceptable, while noting he hadn’t yet spoken to his pitcher about it but planned to.

There is always going to be a conversation. Back in April, after the Mets were swept at home by a Colorado Rockies team that lost 119 games the previous season and scored one total run across 18 innings of a doubleheader, Cohen said on air that “at some point, you gotta call people out.” There is no evidence that conversation ever happened in any meaningful way.

Tuesday’s loss dropped the Mets to the same record the 2024 team had when a glove toss into the stands sparked a team meeting that eventually carried them all the way to Game 6 of the NLCS. That team had enough collective will to manufacture a turnaround out of thin air. This version of the Mets has none of that connective tissue. They rank dead last in OPS and slugging percentage, 28th in runs scored and RBIs, and have been dropping pop-ups in games they managed to win against the Yankees. They are not a team on the verge of a breakthrough. They are a team that cannot cover home plate in a blowout loss and, according to Darling, have been doing so every single game.

Darling has watched this franchise for four decades, as a pitcher, as an analyst, through championships and collapses. When he says the coaches are too afraid to hold anyone accountable, it means a lot more than a frustrated fan screaming it from the upper deck.