Omar Minaya is still running the Mets, no matter what you might hear elsewhere.
In a “Hot Stove” interview with SNY on Thursday, the Mets GM declared he still as “full autonomy” running the team, disputing claims that his role has been lessened or that he’s on the way out.
“Yes, I do have full autonomy,” Minaya told host Kevin Burkhardt. “I know there’s been some talk about that. The bottom line is that I have full autonomy; the bottom line is that we have a good group of staff that we work together; the bottom line is that we make decisions, and like anything else, I have assistants around me, and like anything else, but it’s full autonomy, we feel good about working together and we are continue to work together.
“And I understand there’s gonna be a lot of article written about how the situation with the Mets is, but when I tell you that I have full autonomy, I have full autonomy.”
Minaya said that autonomy included being able to pursue any free agent without budget restrictions, but the team failed to sign John Lackey, Bengie Molina and Joel Pineiro, among others.
“No, like anything else, we have, and I say this, we go out, we pursue certain players, some of the players that are out there we have gotten certain amount of whether salaries that we say hey look we were interested in the players but that being said, we’ve acquired the players that we wanted to,” Minaya said.
The Mets did sign Jason Bay to play left field and add pop to the lineup, even though there have been questions raised about his health.
“To me, when you get a Jason Bay when you’re able to bring him on board, you bring in a player that for me needed this year,” Minaya said. “We needed that power hitter
“From a salary standpoint, from a budget standpoint, all of us as general managers, we have a budget, we work within that budget, and we work the best way we can to put that team together. I feel comfortable that we’ll be able to put that team together.”
That team will bring back a starting rotation nearly identical to last year, when the team went 70-92 and missed the playoffs. Minaya called Lackey a “difference maker,” but said other pitchers on the free-agent market — a group including Pineiro, Jason Marquis, Ben Sheets, Jon garland and John Smoltz — isn’t any better than what the Mets already have.
“But so far, the way we look at it is, I was very encouraged by the minicamp to be able to see Johan Santana, to be able to see Oliver Perez, to be able to get the reports that John Maine is coming along good. Fernando Nieve has pitched very well in Venezuela,” Minaya said. “So we feel that at least from the group of guys that we have, now remember last year at this time with this same group of guys, a lot of people were predicting us to be able to get to the playoffs and possibly go to the World Series.
“Our guys are still young, I have a lot of confidence in (pitching coach) Danny Warthen, I have a lot of confidence that our guys staying healthy is the main thing that we have to focus on.
“I think that it’s fair to say that if you look at our guys the way they pitched in ’07, if you look at our guys the way they pitched in ’08, and you look at some of the free agents that were out there, OK, I mean you couldn’t say there’s a big difference between our guys and some of those free agents that have been out there this year.”
According to hotfootblog.com, Minaya also addressed several other offseason issues:
He said Molina preferred to stay on the West Coast (he signed with the Giants) and was looking for a bigger deal to come east.
Minaya said he knew Carlos Beltran was having his later-disputed knee surgery, and the fault was not Beltran’s but with the process.
Minaya said he has a three-year contract and does not feel his job is in jeopardy, but that New York fans demand a winning team.
He would not say he is looking for another catcher, with Omir Santos, Henry Blanco and Josh Thole expected to compete for the job.
Minaya said the injury problems and communication breakdowns surrounding them would not plague the team again.
Minaya did tell SNY,” If we stay healthy, we’re gonna be a competitive team, we’re gonna be a good team.”
With SNY.tv