27
2011
Omar Minaya Is In A Tough Spot
An article by Hojo's Mojo
After two different tenures with the Mets, six as GM and six as an assistant GM, Omar Minaya is probably one of the longest tenured employees in the Mets front office after Jay Horwitz.
When Minaya was finally relieved of his duties at the end of last season, he was told that he could stay on with the organization in a different capacity.
Yesterday, Alderson spoke a little bit about the situation with Omar and said that he has offered his predecessor a role with the Mets, but still has not heard back from him. Alderson gave no description of what that role was.
He indicated that the two of them shared dinner earlier this month and that the ball was now in Minaya’s court.
“Look at it from Omar’s perspective,” Alderson said. “Coming back to the organization would involve a certain adjustment from his standpoint, psychologically, emotionally. He’s got a lot invested here with the position he had over all of those years. Coming back and interacting with many of the same people in a different capacity is a change. I think anybody would need some time adjust to that.”
I look at Omar Minaya as a sympathetic figure these days. He gave it his best shot and started out with a great vision and promising results, but somewhere down the road he lost his way and veered terribly off course.
Still, if the Mets do make some noise this season as Alderson expects they will, Minaya should still share in a big part of any glory. Aside from the $8 million dollars of the projected $140 million dollar payroll the new regime spent, the vast majority of the Mets resources still hail from Omar Minaya, and in many ways this is still the same team we ended last season with.
I’m actually glad Minaya is sticking around in some capacity. The last good memories this team I had were in 2006 and he was a big reason for that. Before that I have to go all the way back to 2000 – -many forget that he was a significant part of that too as Steve Phillips’ assistant.
I know it’s very fashionable to knock Omar Minaya these days, but if he didn’t truly love the Mets, he could have said sayonara a long time ago and just collected all the money that is still owed to him. He didn’t. Instead he’s agonizing over making a tough decision to stay on in a subordinate position, something that most of us probably would have walked away from. He is truly in a tough spot.
About the Author: Rob Johnson
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I have to say, this story reminds me that my friend Steve Keane over at Kranepool Society punk’d me when he said that Omar got a job as talent scout with NY Yankees…then it clicked over the story about Bartolo Colon. (LOL)
Minaya’s Legacy I continue to say has yet to be finalized. The next few years may determine how Minaya is remembered with so many Baby Mets in the pipeline waiting to see if any become big pieces of any future Mets success.
Very true MNJ!
If we happen to compete and win this year you have to give Omar some credit because we will be winning largely with a roster he built.
Unless Chris Young or Capuano mange to win Cy Young! lol
I thought Omar was the right guy at the right time but he did veer off course drastically and tried to cover one losing bet by doubling down on another and they all busted on him.
He also had some truly bad luck. Duaner Sanchez, Fern, injuries to Beltran and Reyes but he compounded them with the type of blunders that defy a rational thought process.
He leaves our farm system MUCH improved over what he inherited, although to be fair he was the recepiant of two recent graduates who were about to become All Star’s. Our current system while lacking bonafide can’t miss prospects does have quite a few interesting possiblities in the low minors and the PSL team in the FSL should be real exciting to watch. How many of Omar’s “guys” that make it up here and what they do when they get here will ultimately become his legacy.
His biggest talent turned out to be his biggest fault. He was GREAT at finding guys on the last legs of their career, throwing them a lifeline and seeing them back up his judgement. He unfortunately then relied on them over, and sometimes over again, made sure they got paid and then they let him down.
He relied too much on the owners check book and your choices are always limited to who happens to be a free agent that year or who’s team wants to trade a guy for prospects and salary relief. Not the best way to go about building a team.
He made a few good trades, a few bad ones and a few where the thought process behind them had to be lost at sea that day.
On the day Omar was hired he said “we’re going to get younger and more athletic.” I believed him and thought, finally we have a guy who gets it, and not only that but a guy who can do it, and even do it in markets we had previously not been all that active in. Sadly that was not to be. Maybe the plan all along was to get young AFTER the dinosaurs fade away but a lot of that youth never did pan out. Fern, Marte, Pena Jr. It’s not easy projecting 16 year olds and realistically they couldn’t have been up here during 2007 and 2008 anyway. The fact remains that we did not get younger and more athletic, in fact we had more 40 year olds on the team after the steroid era ended than we did during it. Same old Mets, always the last to figure it out.
The Draft. This is where I criticize Omar the most. He gave away #1, supplementary round picks and 2nd round picks like crazy, sometimes literally. He failed to let guys go and get the picks despite knowing the condition of the farm. He gave away high picks and failed to keep others. That could have easily been our RFer, LFer, 2B and SP. Easily. He thought he could do it all through the IFA market but it took too long. That’s why he started rushing guys. That and the fact that they were making the minimum.
When Omar did keep the picks he drafted for help ASAP as the most important criteria instead of getting the best guy. Drafting relief pitchers out of college is wasteful. His 2007 draft is absolutely putrid from picks 1 to 7 and totally lacking in any kind of coherent long range thinking. Maybe that was the Wilpon’s, who knows. If so then Omar still gets some of the blame because he knew better, he was the expert, he could have cut back here or there if need be. He should have insisted.
He also hired his friend to run the farm system and his friend spent some of the early afternoon hours undermining his manager with the players and courting favor with the naive and gullible J.Wilpon. Some friend.
His friend did a ROTTEN job of player development. This I believe is what caused Omar to make increasingly reckless gambles because he was running out of players and running out of time.
All in all I like Omar, I thought his business practices would be totally different than the other GM’s the Wilpon has hired but instead he did more of the same things they all do. Wonder what the common denominator is there? Omar, We wish you the best, we know you tried, your a New Yorker just like us and if you ever get another gig as GM I’m sure you’ll do it different.