Former Mets great Carlos Beltran is getting another chance with the club.
Sources tell The Post the Mets are hiring their former star center fielder to join their front office, where he will work under general manager Billy Eppler. It isn’t clear what Beltran’s duties will be, but he is a well-regarded baseball mind as well as a former superstar player.
Beltran’s hiring comes three years after he was hired as Mets manager and then fired after he was linked to the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal. Mets manager Buck Showalter considered Beltran for his coaching staff a year ago and this offseason as assistant hitting coach.
Beltran recently informed YES Network that he was leaving his broadcast job with it. Andrew Marchand reported in The Post there were plans to move Beltran from broadcasting games into the studio to do pregame and postgame duties.
The Mets couldn’t be reached for comment.
After a 20-year playing career, Mets’ ex-general manager Brodie Van Wagenen hired Carlos Beltran to succeed Mickey Callaway as manager following the 2019 season. But Beltran lasted less than three months in charge, and never managed a single game, before he stepped down after the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal was uncovered. MLB determined that Houston illegally stole signs in its World Series-winning 2017 season, including the postseason as well as part of the 2018 season. Beltran had played his final season with the Astros in 2017.
Just days before Beltran and the Mets parted ways, MLB revealed that he had played a pivotal role in orchestrating the cheating system’s creation and implementation, which had players illegally pick up catchers’ signs via a center-field camera. Teammates then relayed the signs to the batter by banging on garbage cans.
Although no players were punished, Beltran was the only player named in the report. Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow and manager A.J. Hinch were both fired as a result of the scandal, and the Red Sox fired Alex Cora, who served as the Astros’ bench coach at the time, though he has since been rehired by Boston.
Beltran enjoyed a seven-year tenure as a player with the Mets, recording a .280/.369/.500 slash line with an .869 OPS, 149 home runs and 559 RBIs. He was an All-Star four times with the Mets, won the Gold Glove as a center fielder three times and won two Silver Slugger awards in New York. He notably helped the team to the NLCS in 2006, but he left fans with perhaps one of their lasting memories of him to end the series. In Game 7, Beltran looked at a curveball from a then-young Adam Wainwright of the Cardinals to strike out with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth inning, ending the game and Mets’ season. Despite elite production while in Queens, many fans seemingly held resentment over that at-bat.
Before signing with the Mets in 2005, Beltran broke in with the Royals, where he won American League Rookie of the Year in 1999, and played part of a season with the Astros. After his Mets tenure, Beltran had stints with the Giants, Cardinals, Yankees, Rangers and Astros again.
Last year, the Yankees brought Beltran back into baseball when he joined their YES booth as a color commentator during games. He struggled in the transition to media, however, and largely was met with criticism by fans.
— Additional reporting by Jared Schwartz