How I Spent July: By Omar Minaya

You may not think Omar Minaya was active at the trade deadline, but do you really know how much effort it takes to wave the cabana boy over to order a vodka and pineapple juice with one hand, while calling Alex Anthopoulos on the cell phone to trade away your opening day cleanup hitter for a player to be named later with the other?

Oh, but there’s more.

Here’s the way I’m looking at this Deadline Day (which is like Apology Day but quieter): Whatever your reaction is, you’re right.  It’s absolutely frustrating to see everyone else active, whether it be landing a big pitcher, bullpen help, a stud prospect, or a little bit of everything, while Omar Minaya was off having a garage sale begging people on the street to relieve him of colorful lampshades, sweaters that are three sizes too small, and Luis Castillo.

Really, we all saw this coming.  It wasn’t hard to figure it out once all the big ticket items went early, and nothing that was left was worth what people were asking for.  (Josh Thole and Bobby Parnell for Brett Myers?  After trading Roy Oswalt for mulch?  Did Ed Wade discover Purple Drank in Houston?)  It certainly wasn’t hard for me to figure out 18 days ago:

So how much do you want to bet that the next time Minaya is asked about deadline acquisitions, he’ll say something like this:

“Well we’re gonna look everywhere to improve our team. You know, but we feel that getting Carlos Beltran back is like a deadline acquisition for us.”

Now check out what Omar actually said yesterday:

“Some of our moves were guys coming back — like a Beltran coming back, like a Castillo coming back. Those are some of the moves that we upgraded on the position-player front.”

Let’s face it, if I can figure it out, it’s not hard to figure out.  He says the same thing every year … who wouldn’t be frustrated by that alone?  And by the way, what’s this “we upgraded” garbage?  You, Omar, didn’t upgrade a damn thing.  I would think that modern medicine had more to do with that.

Now, if your take on the deadline is that Omar didn’t do anything, which means he didn’t do anything stupid, you’re right as well.  Thole and Parnell for Myers might have been the transaction to send thousands over their own personal edge.  And with the team hovering around the .500 mark, it wasn’t the time to give away young talent for whatever was left just to appease.  Inactivity is frustrating enough, making a trade for public relations sake would have been cyanidelicious.  But what does that say about how low the bar is?  Do you celebrate because the general manager didn’t do anything stupid?  Because what some people call prudent, others call being a fraidy cat … or the kid who has to ask mommy permission for everything.

The one thing I’ll say is that enough talent in the farm system to have somewhat of a homegrown team.  Think about it: Thole will probably be your catcher next season.  If Fernando Martinez stays healthy, he could be given a shot in right field next season.  Add those two to Davis, Reyes, Wright, maybe Tejada if somebody buys Castillo at the garage sale, and maybe Angel Pagan if the team decides that the winter is the right time to deal Carlos Beltran (and if you ask me, if trading Beltran to restock the farm is an option, the winter would pretty much be the only time to get some kind of comparable value, not this deadline just back from injury, and not next deadline when he would be just a rental since Scott Boras has never met an exclusive negotiating window he’s gotten along with.)  That’s seven of eight position players that are homegrown (via Chicago in Pagan’s case).  If that’s how the club wants to roll, fine.  If that’s the direction, then at least it’s a direction.

But if that’s the case, it underscores the severe need for this ownership group … if they don’t want to spend huge amounts of cash on free agents any more, to put the money into the scouting system here in the U.S. and abandon the dream of “owning the international market“.  With between 20-25 teams only paying slot for prospects, how relatively easy would it be to recognize the best talent in the country by just putting a relative small amount of money into the scouting system?  Because to me, and maybe I’m beating a familiar drum, but you absolutely cannot revert back to producing home grown talent without making sure the home grown talent is the best available?  I don’t care how much “financial trouble” this franchise is in, they have to spend money somewhere.  If the money’s not there for the likes of Cliff Lee, then it absolutely has to go towards your farm.  Forget the Caribbean, forget Japan, forget Korea, forget the planet Jupiter, there’s talent here.  The homegrownness on the roster is a start.  But there’s a long way to go.

Of course, I’m injecting logic into a situation which clearly doesn’t have any.  And I know I might as well be shouting down the Lincoln Tunnel at 3AM (and if you’ve ever done that, you know how pointless that is) because nobody listens to me anyway.  The important thing is that the Mets beat the Diamondbacks, finally.  It was such an emotional scene that Fred Wilpon had a Johnny Podres flashback and has commissioned Omar to trade Davis, Thole, Parnell and Jenrry Mejia for, assuming he clears waivers, Don Newcombe.  The pennant push is here.

Oh, I almost forgot this nugget: My sources have told me that just hours before the trade deadline on Saturday, Jason Bay had ice cream with Ron Artest.  Bay had butter crunch, while Artest had mint chocolate chip.  Reports that the ice cream was eaten out of little helmets (y’all) are unconfirmed at this time.