NEW YORK — The New York Mets are hiring Troy Snitker as their hitting coach, a source confirmed to ESPN, as the club continues to overhaul its coaching staff after a frustrating 2025 season that ended without a postseason berth.
Snitker, 36, previously served as the Houston Astros’ hitting coach for seven seasons until he was dismissed earlier this month. He is the son of former Atlanta Braves manager Brian Snitker, who stepped down from his post after the season.
Troy Snitker will work under Jeff Albert, who was recently promoted from his role as the organization’s director of hitting development to director of major league hitting and will be in uniform next season.
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SNY first reported Snitker’s hiring.
It will be a slightly different structure than the Mets had in place the past two seasons, when Eric Chavez and Jeremy Barnes served as co-hitting coaches. Both coaches were dismissed days after the Mets fell short of a postseason berth. Chavez then publicly lamented that employing two lead hitting coaches produces confusion.
The Mets finished 10th in the majors in runs scored behind a star core of outfielder Juan Soto, first baseman Pete Alonso, shortstop Francisco Lindor and outfielder Brandon Nimmo. Alonso, however, plans to opt out of his contract to become a free agent for the second straight offseason.
Also as of Monday, the Mets and first base coach Antoan Richardson have not come to terms on a new contract, and he is expected to leave the organization, sources told ESPN’s Jeff Passan. The 42-year-old Richardson, lauded for his work with Mets base runners, will seek another job when his contract expires.
This season, Richardson developed a close relationship with right fielder Soto, who credited Richardson for pushing him to steal a career-high 38 bases after never stealing more than 12 in a season. At one point this season, the Mets stole 39 straight bases without getting caught, tying the longest streak in Major League Baseball history.
A native of the Bahamas and a former outfielder, Richardson rose from a 35th-round draft pick out of Vanderbilt to appear in 22 games for the Atlanta Braves and New York Yankees across two seasons. He previously served as a coach in the San Francisco Giants organization, starting in the minors before serving as both a first base and third base coach with the big league club over five seasons.
He is the eighth coach to leave the Mets, voluntarily or not, since the team’s season ended a month ago.
The organization remains in the market for more big league coaching staff hires after pitching coach Jeremy Hefner and third base and infield coach Mike Sarbaugh were not retained; catching instructor Glenn Sherlock retired; and assistant pitching coach Desi Druschel returned to the Yankees over the weekend after one season with the Mets. The Mets also recently tabbed Kai Correa to replace John Gibbons as bench coach under manager Carlos Mendoza.
The staff overhaul was enacted after the Mets, with a roster totaling nearly $430 million in payroll and projected luxury tax, went from carrying the best record in the majors in mid-June to finishing 83-79 and losing a tiebreaker with the Cincinnati Reds for the final National League wild-card spot.
