26
2009
Omar Minaya Has Come Full Circle
An article by 
Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away. Now it seems as though they’re here to stay. Oh I believe in yesterday. Suddenly, I’m not half the man I used to be. There’s a shadow hanging over me. Oh yesterday, came suddenly. – The Beatles
Omar Minaya has come full circle. His five year tenure is slowly coming to an end, and his five year plan is as distant now as it was in 2004 when he unveiled it to a fan base that was on life support.
Joel Sherman reminds us, in his Sunday column in the NY Post, just how similar our circumstances are to the franchise Omar Minaya was supposed to save.
First, remember some of the reasons why the Mets named Minaya the general manager on Sept. 30, 2004. Exactly two months earlier, the Mets had traded a pitching prospect named Scott Kazmir for Victor Zambrano. The day the Mets made that trade, they were four games under .500, fourth in the NL East, and ninth in the wild card, 7 1/2 games back. The deal for Zambrano (and also the same day for Kris Benson) was designed ostensibly to fool fans into believing the team was still in contention and that good tickets still should be bought.
In the past week, Minaya proclaimed the Mets “buyers” in the trade market at a moment when they were six games under .500, fourth in the NL East, and tied for eighth in the wild card, 7 1/2 back. Good tickets still available at Citi Field in case you are interested.
In an attempt to show us how bad organizations remain bad organizations, Sherman goes onto review Omar’s five years of “doomed to failure” management.
Of course, the main reason the Mets needed a change is because there were too many chefs in the kitchen. Even Al Leiter and John Franco were influencing policy and shaping baseball decisions. The pitching coach was acting like an assistant general manager, and it was hard to determine who was leading who. Too many rogue elements were suddenly running rampant.
Omar was going to change that and restore order, and for about 15 minutes he did. Who knew though, that he was going to show up with his own entourage, each one working in the shadows and acting like captains in the Gambino family.
The Wilpons also cited Omar Minaya’s pedigree as a top baseball talent evaluator. Sherman explains,
And let us not forget the Wilpons never really interviewed Minaya for the job. They flew to Montreal to all but beg the then-Expos general manager to take the position. When asked at the press conference what they liked so much about Minaya, the Wilpons touted Minaya’s talent-evaluating acumen. But when pressed, neither Fred nor Jeff Wilpon could cite a single example they liked of his evaluating skill. When pressed for what his plan was, Minaya hemmed and hawed initially and then said, “The plan is pitching, defense and athleticism.”
Five years later, how is he doing on those fronts? His only two pitchers of any note — Johan Santana and Francisco Rodriguez — were examples more of checkbook decision-making, not evaluation. The defense is atrocious and the athleticism is skimpy, which is a key failing.
If Omar Minaya is a talent evaluator, than I guess that makes me a Pulitzer Prize writer, and we all know I actually rank somewhere between a fifth grader with a thesaurus and a toddler who used a dictionary to step up and reach for the cookie jar on the counter.
In five years, Minaya is responsible for one barely average starting pitcher in Mike Pelfrey. a .240 hitting first baseman, and a reliever with an ERA north of 5.00. Impressive indeed…
The farm is filled mostly with unrealized potential that is another five years away from bearing fruit, if they even bear fruit at all.
Some say that he recently moved his best prospects to acquire marquis player, Johan Santana. But I say that’s a load of bunk. We gave up nothing for Santana… just a bunch of warm bodies. We blindsided the Twins and now they know it. They should have jumped on Joba and Hughes. Those were real prospects… legitimate prospects. They should have jumped on Jacoby Ellsbury and Clay Buchholz. Those were blue chippers all the way… The Mets gave up who? Guerra, Gomez, Mulvey and what? Yeah, those guys really depleted our farm system, gimme a break!
What really did deplete our farm was a series of ill-advised trades perpetrated by none other than Omar Minaya. The real prospects were the ones that got away for nothing in return. Heath Bell, Matt Lindstrom, Brian Bannister, to name a few. Talent evaluator? I think not. I’m not saying trading those guys was a bad idea, but in all those trades, the players received are not even on a major league map, and therein lies the problem.
In ten years he has brought two NL East franchise to their knees and left them with a barren wasteland in the minors. Luckily, Washington continues to recover and will be pumping out some real blue chip talent over the next 18 months, but unfortunately we aren’t as lucky.
Our minor league teams combined are now 66 games below .500 and most of the teams are the worst in their leagues, including both higher level teams at AAA Buffalo and AA Binghamton. Wow, did you get a whiff of that? Something really stinks around here.
You can blame the injuries all you want, but the Mets were not able to replace even one injured player with any major league ready player. Not one. And that is an indictment on Omar Minaya.
During last night’s broadcast, Gary Cohen mused at how the Pirates brought up someone from their minors named, Garrett Jones. In 19 games he has already homered ten times in July, while the Mets had only five July homers as a team going into the game. This is the Pirates we’re talking about… Jones is nothing but a minor league journey man, but as of right now he’d be more valuable to the Mets than anything they’ve got in the minors, and that’s the point Gary Cohen was making.
So here we are again.
The organization finds itself exactly where we left off in 2004 when Minaya first burst onto the scene. He has had five years of Wright, Reyes and Beltran as his core players with nothing to show for it. (Two-thirds coming from Steve Phillips, and one-third from Wilpon’s checkbook) Do we really want to give him another five years at this point?
About the Author: Joe DeCaro
Went to my first Mets game, a Mayors Trophy game at Shea, in '73. We beat the Yankees 8-4 and I was hooked. I marched in two Banner Day parades, and before the Grand Slam single, there was the "Hendu Can Do" grand slam - I was there. I've collected Mets memorabilia all my life and started Mets Merized Online to feed my addiction.
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What would any team give to have had five years of Beltran, Reyes and Wright? What a waste of five years. In his five years you forgot to mention that we have added no core player as a result of his great talent evaluation skills. No core players in five years? You can’t make this stuff up. I’m surprised at all the boneheads that still stick up for him.
People laugh at me but I don’t care…I still say bring back Steve Phillips. So what if he blasts the organization, how many of you blast your former employees? He works for ESPN? Get over it, it’s a job and we would all do the same thing.
Only thing is I don’t know how good/bad the relationship between Phillips and the Wilpons is. Which brings up another point. I would really LOVE to see the Wilpons sell the team, too. I have had it with them….like spineless jellyfish there have been no public statements on the recent events? Imagine George Steinbrenner in his heyday what he would do????
They are passing the buck to Omar. Also they oversaw the construction of the HUGE, HUGE debacle that is now the home of the Brooklyn Dodgers. That stadium needs a complete overhaul or else it will be the source of much angst among Mets fans for years to come.
I’m glad you chose not to give any credence to Sherman’s opinion that we need to add LaRussa. I agreed with most of his argument regarding Minaya, but when I got to his solution it was like a wicked curve. I think LaRussa might be the only guy who qualifies as a bigger hot head than Tony B.
But it’s true about Omar. Five years is a long time to try and right the ship, and he had the advantage of three great young core players to do it with. And still he failed.
He doesn’t deserve five more years. He doesnt deserve five more minutes.
The team is starting to play a lil better with the trade deadline coming up fast. There is no doubt that Frenchy has helped (14 rbis in 12 gms) but, is 7 1/2 gms out of the wild card to much? I dont think so. The Mets play all of the teams above us(i think) and have a chance of making a difference in this thing. I say another bat(still really like Aubrey Huff), a solid starting pitcher(Zach Duke anyone), a fresh Sheff, a healthy Jose Reyes, and Billy Wags could really turn this team around. I may be asking for way to much but I still have faith, Lets Go Mets!!!
I am actually surprised that twe never actually saw Bartolo Colon pitching for us this past five years.
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Omar has made his share of mistakes, but let’s remember what it was like before him. Dreadful.
I say, “Stick with Omar.”
When are we going to stop paying attention and believing everything that bloggers or real reporters say?
The team was within a few outs of being in the Series in 2006. Yes, our team choked in 2007…but if you ask me 2008 was different. If Billy Wagner doesn’t get hurt we would have made the playoffs. After all, under our new manager we played very well until the injury to our main bullpen guy. Omar went out and totally revamped the pen for 2009 but the injuries this year…
Fact is Omar brought Pedro here and despite his injuries his arrival brought new life to this franchise and helped to lure Carlos Beltran and Carlos Delgado to come here. Beltran has earned hsi money and Delgado played solidly until he got hurt and although he slumped badly for a year, he did come back and hit very well until this injury.
If there is blame to place, let us remember a few things…
The deals that our past GM made sucked! Too many trades that were going to put us over the top. Robbie Alomar….Mo Vaughn….and then Scott Kasmir for Victor Zambrano along with the infamous Anna/Chris Benson deal.
Trading and free agent signings are often a gamble. Some work, some do not work. We screamed for Luis Castillo’s head for more than a year but he has played pretty well other than his one handed disaster vs the Yankees this year. A four year deal for him was too long but it was a gamble that he could be productive for a year or two and be one of those final pieces of the puzzle guy. No one could have imagined the misfortunes that took place this year especially after Omar got us one of the the best starters in Santana and one of the best closers in K-Rod in consecutive years….
If the financial integrity of this franchise has not been doomed by the losses in the Bernie Madoff nightmare it will be interesting to see what Omar does in the offseason to get the team back on the right track. Right now the Phillies are much stronger than we are even before a deal to get a Roy Halladay. The important idea is to determine whether the healthy return of Jose Reyes,Carlos Beltran, and Carlos Delgado and some pitching help make us real contenders or are we better off trading some of our good players to restock the team with young prospects…
Omar did go out and PAY for some talent.
But he didn’t development any on his own. Thats a bad evaluator