Meeting Of The Minds In Atlanta

According to David Lennon at Newsday, GM Omar Minaya and COO Jeff Wilpon will both be in Atlanta holding a summit meeting to discuss among other things the team’s sluggish start and the immediate future of Oliver Perez.

How I’d love to be a fly on the wall for that…

Lennon writes,

As much as everyone wants to dismiss Ollie and dump him in the minors, remember this is a three-year, $36-million business investment. The Mets have to tread carefully with Perez, and not just for the short-term benefit of this season. They can’t just wash their hands of him.

Like it or not, he’s supposed to be this team’s No. 3 starter, and it might be helpful if Perez returns to that role at some point. It’s not as simple as sending him somewhere in the minor-league system to get straightened out.

Perez has gone form Good Ollie/Bad Ollie to just Bad Ollie now and at a huge expense.

It will be interesting to see how the Mets confront the situation and find a solution that will get Perez back into the rotation as a viable starter. It won’t be easy as his psyche has become so deteriorated that he will have to be rebuilt from scratch.

I don’t believe he will see any time in the minors simply because Perez will not agree to it. It leaves the Mets no other choice but to try and repair Perez while taking up a valuable spot in the bullpen. My guess is that Takahashi will replace him in the rotation unless the Mets make some sort of a trade.

There is also the possibility that Wilpon is coaxed into upping the payroll so that Minaya has some wiggle room to do something more significant. We’ll monitor the situation and keep you posted if anything newsworthy emerges from their meeting.