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Nothing earth shattering,but I do like his attitude...
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SNY.tv: Would it be fair to say that your job during the offseason is busier than your job during the season?
Omar Minaya: Possibly. It's much busier than the regular season. Especially in the fall, this time of the year, you have to spend a lot of time signing players, contracts, all those kinds of things. So it is fair to say, that the offseason, yeah, it's busier.
SNY: What's the next big deadline or thing that Mets fans should be talking about? When's the general manager's meeting?
OM: The general manager's meeting is a week from Monday. They're going to be over in Naples, Fla. This year.
SNY: What's the thing that most surprised about the amazing run by the Mets this year? Is there one thing that stands out as totally unexpected?
OM: I just think that the amount of injuries and the ability for the guys to pick each other up. We had 14 starting pitchers, ended up with Games 6 and 7 being pitched by Oliver Perez and John Maine and we had a chance to win those games with those guys pitching.
SNY: Do you think that El Duque would have been ready for Game 1 of the World Series?
OM: Yes, he would have been ready.
SNY: Did you ever think about how the Sanchez accident had a ripple effect for the rest of the season and if he had taken another taxi a minute later, a lot of things might have evolved differently than they did?
OM: Well, you always do think about that. But it's a waste of time because at the end of the day, things can be said about that, a lot of folks can say that about whatever injuries they had. But I don't spend much time with that.
SNY: I've read where you said your experience in Montreal helped you fine-tune your search for players, like a Jose Valentin. Is there a part of the job, be it a signing of a big name like a Beltran, or finding a diamond in the rough, like an Endy Chavez, that's more fun or more fulfilling?
OM: They're both exciting. The star player, definitely there's a lot of fun in that. And there's a lot of both, I mean, in finding the diamond in the rough, that's a different challenge. That one you have to wait to allow it to develop. So when you see it in a John Maine or Endy Chavez, it's a lot of fun also.
SNY: I was in Port St. Lucie for the first spring training game in March, and I saw you take Lastings Milledge over to Frank Robinson and introduce him. I was very touched by that and I was wondering why you did that.
OM: Well, Frank was a great player, and a great example to a young player, like a Lastings Milledge. Anybody who's young, you want to introduce to a Hall of Famer, I think it's exciting. I've done that in the past with Phil Humber and Tom Seaver, and I think that's very exciting.
SNY: Was Lastings taken aback or impressed?
OM: I think he was. Sometimes some of these guys don't know who these players are at all. So you have to be careful, you know what I'm saying? He knew who Frank Robinson was. But sometimes kids don't know the history. It's important that they know about those great players from the Hall of Fame.
SNY: I remember the famous Vince Coleman interview. Do you remember when he was asked about Jackie Robinson?
OM: No, I don't.
SNY: Coleman said he really didn't know about him.
OM: Well, you do have that. People tend to forget history. Some are better than others, put it that way. That's not only in baseball, that's in broadcasting, doctors and other things.
SNY: Any thoughts of Frank Robinson joining the organization? You guys worked closely together in Montreal.
OM: Nothing I can say on that right now, but there's no plan on that right now.
SNY: Are you a student of Mets history?
OM: I wouldn't consider myself a student; I was a kid who grew up in Queens. I'm not Marty Noble, I can tell you that. Marty Noble is a great student of Mets' history. I'm not at that level.
SNY: The thing with Mota that just happened. Is it the fact that he'd be out for 50 games, almost a third of the season, or the fact that he had this failed drug test, which would have more of an impact on your thinking of resigning him?
OM: Yeah, we'd have to reevaluate that.
SNY: Any unknown names that Met fans can look forward to in terms of what you guys have in Double-A and Triple-A?
OM: In Double-A, we have a got a kid by the name of Carlos Gomez, who we think is very good, very exciting down there. Gomez and Phil Humber, they're known names, but in a lot of ways they're not known by those who don't follow the Mets every day.
SNY: Regarding your new affiliate in New Orleans, I know that you guys wanted to stay in Virginia. Do you think the Mets will play a role in the rebuilding of that city at all?
OM: Yeah, I think that's part of our commitment toward not only being there, but to be able to help out in the community.
SNY: I've seen you on television a lot and you're such a mellow guy. I think the only time I'm aware that you got upset was during an interview on WFAN with Mike Francesca and Chris Russso. Do you think they were trying to push buttons or were they trying to be good reporters?
OM: I think it's a combination. They're very good at what they do. And I don't think I was upset. I think I was able to answer questions. I just wanted to basically make sure those questions were being asked of everybody else. But I think they're very good at what they do. Their job is to push buttons, their job is to create an edge and I get along very well with them. They're excellent at what they do.
SNY: Bob Cousy, the great Celtic basketball player, was talking last week about the passing of Red Auerbach. Contrary to the perception that Auerbach -- when he started five black players in the 60's in Boston -- was interested in civil rights, Cousy said that might have been an effective result of it, but Auerbach really just wanted to win. According to Cousy, Auerbach wanted to find the best players to give him the best chance of winning. You subscribe to that, don't you, in just wanting to find the best players?
OM: There's no doubt that we focus on winning. It's about winning, everything we do is about winning the game or winning the division or winning the championship. So we go for who is the best player. Do people have a perception of other things? I can't control that.
SNY: But also, you've said that you want the team to reflect the city.
OM: Yeah, I definitely want the team to reflect the city. But that does not mean only in its heritage, I also mean in the team. New York is a fast-paced city and we're a fast- paced team. We've led the National League in stolen bases, we play an aggressive, proactive type of game. And that's my reflection of New York City — and also a kind of diversity and we're very proud of that diversity. We're proud of the players that we have on our team. Diverse cultures, diverse age groups and everything else.
SNY: Well, it's very refreshing, because the history of the Mets, from what I know, and I've been around from day one, is they did not always want to reflect the rhythm or the ethnicity of a city.
OM: I've never thought that the Mets never reflected the rhythm of the city. But that's one thing that, definitely over the years of growing up in New York, you never had a Met team that was a speed team.
SNY: Right. But when we think about the Yankees, the Yankees always seemed to reflect the ethnicity, though.
OM: You know, I mean, it's fair to say that since the recent championship teams that they had, they had much more ethnicity than the Mets have had.
SNY: What's this thing on the back pages of the tabloids, that Mussina might be a Met? Is that just some reporter trying to come up with a headline?
OM: This time of the year, you're going to get a lot of headlines on players, and I cannot comment on players. That's going to be mostly what you get this time of the year, and that's fine. That's what makes this game special.
SNY: One of the reporters asked you after Game 7 of the NLCS if you thought the Cardinals were a better team, and you said, yes, they were a better team because they won.
OM: Yeah, of course, yeah. They won. You gotta give them credit.
SNY: But do you think that a GM's perspective is different from a player's perspective? Some of the Mets were quoted as saying, "We were the better team, even though we lost."
OM: Well, the better team is the team that wins. There's two things. The best team in baseball on paper was the New York Yankees. But you don't win on paper.
SNY: So can we expect the Mets in the World Series next year?
OM: I hope so.
SNY: Was this year a successful season? You said it wasn't.
OM: A successful year is when you win the World Series.
SNY: But in spring training, if someone said, you're going to win 97 games and go to a game seven of the NLCS, would you have said I'll take it.
OM: I'd say, that's great. But that wasn't what we set out to do.
Barry Wittenstein is an editorial producer for SNY.tv. |
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