NYT SPORT: Steve Cohen’s Amazin’, Maddening, Money-Losing Bid to Own New York
By Matt Flegenheimer and Kate Kelly
Section: Sports
Source: New York Times
The subject was not baseball.
“He was wondering about hedge fund investments,” Cohen, a hedge fund billionaire, said in an interview, wandering between practice fields in a semi-tucked golf polo at the Mets’ spring facility. “I met him through a friend. ‘Sure, I’ll help you out. I’ll help you think about it.’ Why not?”
Much about Cohen’s life had changed by then, and much more would be changing soon. Seven years earlier, he had been a financial pariah, his firm held up as an emblem of Wall Street malfeasance amid insider trading violations and nearly $2 billion in attendant fines. The stakes of this conversation — which Verlander recalled as a “kindness of his heart” gesture by Cohen with “probably pretty dumbed down” general guidance — were ostensibly smaller, destined to engender more good will than scrutiny, with Cohen primed to join Major League Baseball’s ownership ranks in short order.
But the two kept in touch. In December, Verlander became Cohen’s prized acquisition in another extravagant Mets off-season, his $43.3 million salary accounting for roughly one-eighth of the team’s record-melting 2023 payroll.
Published Date: March 26, 2023 at 02:00AM
By Matt Flegenheimer and Kate Kelly
Section: Sports
Source: New York Times
Once a symbol of Wall Street excess, Cohen has invested lavishly in the Mets, becoming the most beloved billionaire in Queens. Is that enough to reverse team history?
PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — Around early 2020, before the New York Mets were his, Steven A. Cohen received an unexpected request: Justin Verlander, then the Houston Astros’ ace, wanted to speak with him.The subject was not baseball.
“He was wondering about hedge fund investments,” Cohen, a hedge fund billionaire, said in an interview, wandering between practice fields in a semi-tucked golf polo at the Mets’ spring facility. “I met him through a friend. ‘Sure, I’ll help you out. I’ll help you think about it.’ Why not?”
Much about Cohen’s life had changed by then, and much more would be changing soon. Seven years earlier, he had been a financial pariah, his firm held up as an emblem of Wall Street malfeasance amid insider trading violations and nearly $2 billion in attendant fines. The stakes of this conversation — which Verlander recalled as a “kindness of his heart” gesture by Cohen with “probably pretty dumbed down” general guidance — were ostensibly smaller, destined to engender more good will than scrutiny, with Cohen primed to join Major League Baseball’s ownership ranks in short order.
But the two kept in touch. In December, Verlander became Cohen’s prized acquisition in another extravagant Mets off-season, his $43.3 million salary accounting for roughly one-eighth of the team’s record-melting 2023 payroll.
Published Date: March 26, 2023 at 02:00AM
Read More at: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/26/sports/baseball/steve-cohen-mets-new-york.html
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