They'll Get'em Next Year?

The end has come to another disappointing New York Mets season.  It will also be the end of the Jerry Manuel and Omar Minaya regime.  Manuel will be fired as manager and Minaya will be removed from his position as general manager (Minaya might choose to stay in the organization because he is still under contract).  Met fans can look forward to another new direction for the franchise.  As a Met fan, people might think I would be happy about these changes, but I am not.

I will first start with Manuel.  I will not lie and say he is a great manager or even a good one; however he was never dealt a full hand.  He took over in the middle of the season for Willie Randolph 3 years ago as the team struggled.  The team played better after Manuel took over.  The year did not end well with the Mets choking away another post season opportunity, but it is hard to blame Manuel.  Closer Billy Wagner was lost to season ending Tommy John surgery and the bullpen became a disaster.  It was so bad, Luis Ayala was closing games at the end of the year.  Last year the entire team was injured.  Jose Reyes missed almost the entire year, Carlos Beltran missed half the year, and Johan Santana missed the last two months.  This year the injuries continued.  Reyes has been in and out of the line up, Beltran missed more than half the season and struggled when he returned, Jason Bay struggled and then got a concussion missing almost half the season, K-Rod injured himself for the year after beating up his girlfriend's father, and Santana went down with another season ending injury.  No manager can survive that much.

Now for Minaya, he has made some bad moves.  His contracts to Oliver Perez and Luis Castillo are two of the worst contracts in the history of the sport.  He has also done some good things.  He brought in players like Pedro Martinez, Carlos Beltran, Billy Wagner, Johan Santana, K-Rod, and Jason Bay.  Not all of those moves worked out perfectly, but I did not hear many Met fans complain about any of them.  He also traded for Angel Pagan and gave up practically nothing.  Many were critical of him not improving the pitching staff over the off season, yet it has been the strength of the team.   R.A Dickey and Hisanori Takahashi turned into great signings.  The minor league system which was criticized by many, has shown a lot of potential.   Is he the best general manger in the league? No, but he is not as bad as people have made him out to be. 

I put most of the blame on ownership.  Ownership has not always allowed Minaya to do the job he was hired to do.  Omar does not sign the pay checks.  He needed ownerships permission and I believe they held back on him.  This is New York City, not Kansas City.  If your are going to own a team in this town, you need to be in it all the way.  I criticize the Jets a lot, but at least they are willing to take on the Giants.  The Mets have never been willing to take on the Yankees.  When the Yankees did not make the playoffs two years ago, they went into the off season and spent over $300 million on CC Sabathia, Mark Teixeira, and AJ Burnett.  Would the Mets ever come close to doing anything like that? Not a chance.  They make one move every off season trying to put band aids on a team that has way too many leaks.  They go halfway.  They don't even take on the Phillies.  Last year the Phillies traded for Cliff Lee, and in the off season they traded for Roy Halliday.  The Mets did nothing.  When the Mets were still in the hunt after the all-star break, they did nothing to make the team better.  The Phillies went out and traded for Roy Oswalt. 

Right now I can't even say who they should bring in as manager and general manager.  I know for manager there is a lot of talk by Met fans about bringing back Bobby Valentine.  If I remember well, it was not too long ago when Met fans were calling up WFAN wanting Valentine fired.  Valentine did do a great job with the Mets, taking them to a World Series.  The only issue I see with Valentine is he will want a lot of money, and I do not know if the Wilpons are willing to give it to him.  Wally Backman might be another option.  He was a member of the 86 Mets and would be a popular pick for the fans.  Despite that, he is very unproven and has a shaky history (Wife beater).  Hiring him might be too risky for the conservative Wilpons. 

It will be very interesting in the upcoming weeks to see what happens.  In my dreams, the Wilpons would sell the team to Mark Cuban.  Imagine him as the Mets owner.  It would be all the Avion tequila you can drink at Citi Field.  He would go head to head with the Yankees and spend whatever it took to make the team better.  Unfortunately, dreams do not always come true.  The Wilpons will probably own the team past the day I die.  If their financial problems are as accurate as they have been reported, it will be very difficult for the Mets to make any improvements, and they will continue to be second class citizens.

Don't jump off the bridge though.  Maybe next year will be the year.  Here is a classic video to remember the good old days (Lots of mullets, very 80s).