Steve Cohen didn’t hire Scott Havens (above, right) to make trades or scout prospects, but the Mets president of business operations has noted the same problem many others have identified over the past few years: pro baseball needs more star power.
Speaking at the Front Office Sports Huddle in the Hamptons event last week, Havens was asked to name the current “face of baseball,” a longtime parlor game among sports media. The answer has been up for debate for a decade, arguably since Derek Jeter retired in 2014. Angels star Mike Trout had the title at times, depending on whom you asked, but his injuries and lack of postseason experience have hurt his case.
Havens answered with just two names, which he described as a problem for a couple of reasons.
“I think right now, the face of baseball probably is two people, [Shohei] Ohtani and Aaron Judge, on the two coasts,” Havens said. “And that’s not great, because there’s electric young players playing this game that, unless you’re dating a gymnast who has a big social media following, they’re not going to know your name.”
Havens was referring to Pirates rookie pitcher Paul Skenes, a phenom with a fastball that tops 100 miles per hour, who is dating Olivia Dunne, a member of the LSU women’s gymnastics team who boasts more than 10 million social media followers.
As far as some of those “electric” players who haven’t been marketed as much nationally, a few names that fans might point to are Royals shortstop Bobby Witt Jr., Mariners center fielder Julio Rodríguez, and Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz.
“But I think there’s a lot of lessons in that,” Havens continued. “And with Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift, for teams and leagues. I just don’t think baseball and teams have invested in the storytelling. A lot of these players have amazing stories, and Netflix and other platforms have been buying and funding documentaries. Hard Knocks on football is a very watchable show, the PGA Tour, F1, Full Swing … there have been a bunch of these. And I think baseball’s working on one. So this is good. We just need to pick up the pace and be more front-leaning than following up.”
Netflix is currently following the Red Sox season as part of a Hard Knocks–esque documentary that will air next season as part of the streaming service’s latest foray into sports content.
Havens was named Mets president of business operations in November 2023 after serving as CEO of Bloomberg Media for two years. Before Bloomberg, he had an extensive background in magazines at Conde Nast, Atlantic Media, and Time Inc.
Onstage at the Hamptons event, he said running a media company and running the business side of a baseball club aren’t as different as people might assume. “When I took this job, there were a lot of gasps, including from my boss, Mike Bloomberg, who said, ‘Why the f would Steve Cohen hire you to do this?’” Havens said. “But the similarities are there. We sell tickets, we sell sponsorships. And so a lot of the functional parts of running a baseball team, especially where we’re going, where we need to go, as a sport and as a franchise, I’ve already done some of that work.”
