Before and after it was apparent that the 2021 Mets would not only fall short of their goal to be a playoff team but again finish with a losing record, their manager received occasional media questions about his job security.
Yankees new third base coach Luis Rojas’ response always was the same. No one had talked to him about the 2022 club option that part of two-year contract and his focus was on his day-to-day job duties.
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Rojas received the bad news shortly after the Mets concluded a 77-85 season with two losses in Atlanta, and he was crushed. The son of Felipe Alou, brother of Moises Alou and nephew to Jesus and the late Matty Alou grew up in a legendary baseball family, but his baseball growth sprung to much higher levels during his 15 seasons working in the Mets organization. He started working close to home as a rookie league manager with the Dominican Summer League Mets in 2007, then steadily worked his way up the organizational ladder. He joined the Mets’ major league staff as a coach in 2019, then was the fallback choice for manager in 2020 after Carlos Beltran was hired and fired before making it to spring training because he was a ringleader of the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal.
The firing stung Rojas. He had made a lot of close friends during his long run as a Mets employee. He loved being the Mets manager even though his two years was during some of the most trying times in franchise history due to COVID and the organization’s sexual-harassment allegations.
But through it all, Rojas feels that he learned a lot more baseball that will make him a better coach in his new adventure across town.
No, Rojas did not have any reservations going straight from the Mets to the rival Yankees.
“There wasn’t any second thought,” Rojas said. “I know the city. My wife loves the city. My son loves the city. There’s personal stuff that we have in the city too, from a personal standpoint that matters to us. The Yankees organization and the tradition … My father played three years there. My uncle, may he rest in peace, played one year there. There is some family history, as well.”
Besides Felipe and Matty Alou being Yankees outfielders in the 1970s, Rojas built a friendship with Aaron Boone during their two seasons as rival New York managers.
“Aaron was the first manager that called me when I got the manager position with the New York Mets,” Rojas said. “He was welcoming me to the city … and I thought that was pretty neat. So immediately we established a really good connection.”
It took off.
“Every now and then, we’d call or each other or text just to check in,” Rojas said,
From those talks and watching Boone before and during Subway Series games, Rojas realized the Yankees had quality manager running their ship.
“You see the leader, you see the people following,” Rojas said. “Those characteristics you can see from Aaron leading this group.”
Boone felt the same about Rojas, and right away felt he could be a candidate to fill one of the Yankees’ coaching positions that opened up last month. The Yankees started talking about replacing the four departed coaches after Boone signed on for three more years in mid-October, and Rojas’ name kept coming up as a possible replacement for Phil Nevin as third base coach.
“Just looking from afar, he’s certainly somebody that that I respected,” Boone said. “I enjoyed our interactions together. But then as we started to dig a little bit … from people that we contacted just how highly people spoke of him certainly confirmed that we definitely needed to interview him.”
The interview occurred about two weeks ago. Boone, GM Brian Cashman and a lot of other front-office members were involved. According to Boone, the Yankees’ entire contingent was impressed with Rojas coaching experience, which was far beyond most 40-year-olds, as well as his communication skills and baseball IQ.
“It was a pretty healthy process,” Rojas said. “Big group. A lot of questions from different angles, different areas of the game that are real. A lot of new questions, analytical questions, personal questions, baseball questions, you name it.”
Rojas aced the interview.
“I think all of our group kind of fell in love with him as far as everyone kind of giving the thumbs up like, ‘Yeah, this is a guy we need to get with our staff,’” Boone said. “For a fairly young man, he’s worn a lot of hats. He’s got a lot of experience in the minor leagues, obviously managing across town for the Mets. Because of all his managerial experience in the minor leagues, he’s got a lot of third base coaching experience. When we first started interviewing him, I think it was with third base in mind. He expressed how much he enjoys coaching third base having done it so much in the minor leagues.”
About a week ago, the Yankees settled on Rojas to be their third base coach and outfield instructor. After the sides worked out a contract, the hiring was announced Monday.
“It happened in a matter of three days where we went from one conversation to another into the interview,” Rojas said. “I believe it was probably two days later Aaron contacted me and said that they were going to go with me, and ever since we did a lot of things to make this official. But I’ve been very excited for the last week or so.”
Rojas can’t wait to get started. He’s already planning to reach out to all of the Yankees outfielders to touch base. He already knows Aaron Judge, having managed him in the 2014 South Atlantic League All-Star Game. Meantime, Rojas will be watching a ton of game footage this winter from Yankees and opponents’ 2021 games to learn about his players’ base-running skills, opposition’s outfield play and throwing arms, etc. He’ll be diving into the analytics, as well.
“There’s just so much out there that a third base coach can take advantage just to get ready for a game,” Rojas said. “I’m waiting to get my hands on a lot of video and a lot of different data out there that probably is going to put me in a spot to think of some decisions way, way ahead.”
Rojas isn’t looking at his new job as a demotion from his last one. On the contrary, he’s elated to be part of an organization that’s almost always in the playoffs.
And Boone is elated to have a former manager on his staff to carry on with the annual goal to win a championship.
“As far as the interview went, I think he just kind of killed it with everyone,” Boone said. “We all felt like we wanted him to be a part of our staff. From there, it moved pretty quickly. Not only have we added a great baseball man, but I think we’ve added a great person to our staff.”
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Randy Miller may be reached at rmiller@njadvancemedia.com.
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