The Oliver Perez experiment should be over! Saturday’s putrid performance shows that this guy’s career with the Mets is over. Pretty soon Perez will be lucky to throw batting practice for a single A team.
I understand Perez is still owed more than 20 million dollars but he’s doing nothing at all for this team. His presence hurts this team.
I never understood why the Mets had to sign Perez. He had 1 good season in 2007 and that’s it during his tenure for the Mets. Omar Minaya should have never given this guy a 3 year contract. There was no other team even considering Perez no matter what Scott Boras said.
I understand that releasing Oliver Perez could be Omar Minaya signing his own pink slip. Imagine going to your bosses saying we need to cut loose a guy that is making the kind of money he is? Omar I know is not too bright but he should tell the Wilpons that it’s the best move for the team. It will show that mediocre play will not be tolerated if you’re making millions of dollars you don’t deserve or just making the league minimum. Of course the Wilpons would rather see Perez sit in the bullpen doing nothing and pay him instead of let him sit on his couch at home and collect the paycheck. Jerry Manuel has said that he doesn’t foresee when Perez would come into the game. It sounds like to me that the entire bullpen can pitch in a game, then Jeff Francoeur will pitch with Ollie appearing once Francoeur can’t go anymore.
The Mets could trade Oliver Perez if they would be willing to eat most if not all of his contract. Perhaps there’s a team willing to swap bad contracts. Their not going to get an ace or anything like that but maybe they can get a serviceable reliever or career utility player. Ultimately I doubt any team in the majors is going to take Oliver Perez on. The only solution is to cut him lose. We’ve seen smaller market teams eat some big contracts over the years but it’s highly unlikely that the Mets will do this.
Too bad the Mets don’t have a real team leader who can organize a team intervention with Perez. They could tell him that he’s hurting the team by not allowing the minor league assignment. The team can explain that they need him to try and help himself so that in turn Ollie can help the team win. With Oliver staying on the roster but not doing anything the Mets are playing with a 24 man roster. Unfortunately there is no real leader on this team that will take the initiative and do that.
Sunday was an interesting day and not just because the Mets won a game against the Brewers. The Mets on Sunday during the pre-game pretty much blasted Perez. Kevin Burkhardt mentioned that the team has been pretty much begging Perez and his agent to accept a minor league assignment but they refuse to even consider that option. Gary and Ron pretty much called Perez lazy and selfish during the game as well, dedicating a few minutes to discuss Oliver Perez. In Monday’s New York Post 2 players that were not named called out Perez as well. Obviously the team has sent a memo to put as much pressure as possible on Oliver Perez. Unfortunately their pleas on are falling on deaf ears. The guy obviously doesn’t care about this team. He has no desire to help himself or the team but the Mets are still keeping him on this team. Makes no sense at all.
The Mets need to call Scott Boras and Oliver Perez for a meeting. In this meeting they have to lay their cards on the table. Clearly explain to them that they are paying a lot of money to Ollie to pitch for this team. I suggest getting someone other than Omar Minaya to do that. The Mets cannot back down at all in this meeting. Tell Boras that if his client refuses the assignment they will cut him from the roster and do not back down. Unfortunately this ball club is a mess and lacks the backbone needed to go through with this.
Bottom line is this is exactly what is wrong with the Mets. They don’t care about putting out the best product or winning. It’s all about the money for them and agents and players will take advantage of them until they change their way of operating.
