Omar = Overrated?

By Taryn "Coop" Cooper
Posted Tuesday, June 5, 2007

This past week, a writer made a somewhat backhanded compliment towards Omar Minaya. Jonah Keri supplied the dig, regarding Minaya’s legacy as GM with the Mets. “Omar Minaya deserves his share of credit, but remember that Jose Reyes, David Wright and others were in the system before Minaya took the job,” Keri writes in his column dated May 29.

To a lay person, and I’m not considering Keri to be in that population since he follows this stuff for a living, it might look like Omar was simply lucky in the players he’s managed to nab in the almost three years as head nut of the Mets baseball operations. Lucky in the sense that he’s managed to get some proverbial diamonds in the rough but with the checkbook that can catch the best players on the market.

The cornerstones of the team if you will are Reyes and Wright. And Omar was not the GM when they came around. But does that discount everything Omar has done as GM?

From a purely business standpoint (The Coop’s background), Omar is a shrewd headhunter and broker. He knows what he wants and he has a team of experts who guide him in choosing the best prospects or “stocks.” He has been known to trust his scouts with the reports they give him, and in turn he will make sure to submit the request to get the top talent.

One of Omar’s greatest talents is his knack of attracting undervalued players with high upside. This has paid off in spades for Minaya’s teambuilding exercise, for example, with a John Maine or an Oliver Perez. On the surface, it looked as if Omar was able to get a couple of “throw-ins” for established players or “bag of balls,” as Anna Benson called Maine. In stock lingo, however, Omar was able to buy low and sell high chips like Kris Benson and Xavier Nady after they had established themselves as players with upside as Mets. This seems to be a recurring theme. For example, we’ve been able to see the emergence of Ruben Gotay, a straight-up trade for seemingly perennial quadruple-A player Jeff Keppinger, due to Jose Valentin’s knee injury.

If we Mets fans can pick a time where we noticed a change in the Mets organization direction, certainly “Black Friday” would have been that point. Perhaps the greatest aspect of Omar is that he has the benefit of not being the guy who traded Scott Kazmir. Without the outrage surrounding the move, who knows if Omar would have been brought back with the “full autonomy” promise.

To Mets fans, potentially nothing summons our vomit reflexes more so than the thought of Steve Phillips or Jim Duquette executing trades for the Mets. We are well aware of how bad the Mets could be and could have been if Phillips or Duquette were still around. Most of us were a bit squeamish with the turnover and upheaval when Omar finally arrived (again, since it was around the time of "Black Friday" and the Benson trade and.…you get the drift).

Furthermore, the Mets were then the laughingstock not only of New York baseball but all of baseball for the seeming disorganization in the organization. Omar was able to not only bring a sense of calm but also a level of professionalism unseen at that point in the Mets history, even under the Cashen era when the Mets last won a World Championship. Omar immediately got rid of the proverbial dead weight by letting perennial leader John Franco go and by yanking a previously on-the-table offer to would-be ace Al Leiter. And started a youth movement by inking rookie manager Willie Randolph to a contract and making pitches for the best free agents on the market that year.

From my point of view, I tend to look at the Kazmir trade as a positive turning point for the Mets. As a result we got Omar. We may miss Kazmir, but I think we would miss these guys more.

Pedro Martinez
Carlos Beltran
Doug Mientkiewicz (psych!)
Billy Wagner
Carlos Delgado
Paul LoDuca
Duaner Sanchez
Jose Valentin
Ruben Gotay
Oliver Perez
John Maine

I think what is truly unique about Omar Minaya is that he has a propensity to think outside of the box. He values his prospects but with roots deep in the scouting system, he has a great team scoping out the new talent. Minaya also has the benefit of Fred Wilpon’s checkbook, so if he feels the best free agent out there can truly help the team, he has no problem spending the money.

Alternatively, he has no problem NOT spending money if he feels a guy isn’t a good fit. Omar doesn’t panic and make a deal simply to make a deal. He’s sat out the last two trading deadlines quietly almost, except for last year due to Sanchez’s injury. But that turned out to be a good thing, with "Oh Pea" coming to the team.

Is Omar the best GM out there? I wouldn’t say that, since from a business standpoint, we have to give props to John Schuerholz of the Braves for building his minor league teams and having tons of home grown talent and being smart about money. And I have to give props to Billy Beane for making the most of what little he has been given as far as a “spending allowance.” But Omar – Omar is unique. He has the benefit of an open checkbook, but does not feel the need to spend money aimlessly. He also likes to get the best value and highest returns on the players he does have.

So he might not have been personally responsible for Jose Reyes (although arguably he was, green-lighting the signing as Mets' assistant general manager, responsible for international scouting when Reyes was signed) or David Wright, but he is responsible for makeup of the team. Without his add-ins like Delgado and LoDuca, would Wright and Reyes be able to carry the team on their own? I think it’s possible, but not all likely. And being where they are today as opposed to the end of 2004 just speaks volumes. Trust Omar.