Here is the second part of my interview this morning with Mets general manager Sandy Alderson on me weekly Tip-Off Show. You can read part one of Sandy’s interview by clicking here.
John: I’m a gigantic Michael Fulmer fan, I’ve watched him pitch six times this season. I have to ask you, please tell me just how difficult it is to trade a guy like that? It seems to me like you were holding off until the last possible second of the trade deadline before you actually pulled the trigger on that deal.
Sandy: It’s very true, we spent the whole day Friday trying to keep Michael Fulmer out of the deal. Then we looked at the clock and we only had 15 minutes left until the deadline and we realized that the Tigers were not going to budge. We even offered them more players just so we could hang on to him.
But at the end of the day, they just sat firm the whole time and they basically got exactly what they wanted. In retrospect we’re very happy that we did it, and we know Michael is going to be an outstanding pitcher.
John: Sounds like both teams got what they wanted. I’ve been pleasantly surprised by Yoenis Cespedes.
Sandy: We’ve been very fortunate that he’s been able to play some centerfield for us. Originally one of the reasons we went after Carlos Gomez was because he could play centerfield and give us some flexibility at the corners.
But Cespedes has allowed us to do the same thing. Plus I think Juan Lagares has responded positively in what’s now a part-time role. He has been able to focus and work on some things without worrying about his results on a day to day basis. It looks like some of those things he’s applied immediately and it has already paid some dividends. So having Cespedes available to play centerfield has been a real plus for us.
John: You have received a lot of high praise and acclaim for how you were able to retool and replenish the Mets farm system. Because of that, you were able to make those pre-trade deadline deals that seemed to have made a real impact on the major-league roster. What kind of organizational emphasis and initiatives are involved in shaping our minor-league system?
Sandy: Every organization says that they’re going to build their team through their minor-league system, but it really comes down to execution. You start by retaining all of your draft picks, and this year we knew this season was going to be different for us when we gave up a draft pick to sign Michael Cuddyer. That’s something that I don’t foresee us doing again in the future. I think that was the first indicator that we expected this season to be a little bit different.
Retaining your full capacity of drafted players as well as signing them from the international market is just part of it as having a top development team is also a big part of that. Eventually you have to turn that highly regarded talent into professional baseball players.
I’m a big believer in organization and having a systematic approach to things. You know Paul DePodesta and Dick Scott run our minor-league system and they’ve done such a tremendous job of keeping things well-organized from a training standpoint as well as from a performance standpoint.
We have organizational philosophies on hitting and pitching and we try to be consistent in applying those philosophies throughout the system.
The goal of our player development system is to improve the players, but it’s always critical as well to get good talent into our system. We focused on being systematic and well-organized and having coaches who can teach as well as just running games. Those things have been very important.
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Stay tuned for our final installment of our three-part exclusive interview with Mets general manager Sandy Alderson, which we will post very shortly.
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