Santana on Wish List, But So Far It’s All Talk
NASHVILLE, Dec. 5 — Early Wednesday, Mets Manager Willie Randolph baited the hook and cast the line. He spoke specifically of Johan Santana of the Minnesota Twins, a left-handed starter and one of baseball’s best pitchers, who is on the trade market.
“The big fish are out there,” Randolph said. “Santana is still out there. I don’t think that we’re necessarily out of the picture, even though I think Boston and the Yankees get most of the play.”
Could the Mets offer enough to beat out those two power players for the top prize of the off-season? “That’s something that might happen,” Randolph said. “When Santana goes, wherever he goes, hopefully to us, then things will fall into place.”
Later in the day, General Manager Omar Minaya was more circumspect. He would not mention Santana by name. Nor would he mention Érik Bédard of Baltimore and Dan Haren of Oakland, other top pitchers reportedly on the market.
But Minaya used Wednesday’s Detroit-Florida trade as a template to suggest that it is possible to trade multiple prospects for star players, the way the Tigers did when they obtained Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis.
“We’ve had some positive dialogue,” Minaya said, refusing to specify the teams. “It can go from positive to negative real quick. We’re still in play.”
He added, “I don’t like to create a false hope.”
Minaya said multiple prospects, as many as three, might have to be offered “when you’re going to trade for a starting pitcher, a player of magnitude, an All-Star player.”
Should Minaya fail to obtain an ace like Santana, he said he might seek what he called an “innings eater” who can work in the third, fourth or fifth slot in the rotation. On Tuesday, Minaya said he would speak with the agent for Liván Hernández, a free agent who went 11-11 with Arizona last season.
Refusing to discuss Hernández specifically Wednesday, Minaya said conversations had continued with representatives of free-agent players.
Minaya stressed that no deal had to be made during the current meetings, which end Thursday. The season does not begin until April, and the Mets have four experienced starters, along with their prospects.
COPING WITH A SLUMP In discussing the second-half slump of shortstop José Reyes, Willie Randolph compared Reyes to a boxer who is backed into the ropes and has to learn to escape.
Reyes’s slump was part of the reason the Mets squandered first place in the National League East and finished second to the Phillies. But Randolph said he and Reyes had not yet discussed the matter.
“I’ve reached out to him a few times,” Randolph said. “A lot of guys in the off-season, it’s tough to get in touch with them. A lot of phone tag.”
Randolph added: “José ran into probably the biggest slump of his life at the wrong time. He just picked the wrong time to go through a real tough growing pain.”
But Randolph predicted that Reyes would not be adversely affected. “I think he’ll be more determined and know better how to deal with it. José plays the game with free, reckless abandon and is very confident in himself. It shows you how difficult the game is at times. Even great players can’t find the handle sometimes.”
News source：http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/06/sports/baseball/06mets.html?_r=1&ref=baseball&oref=slogin
梅子的GM還拿最近Tigers和Marlins的交易案來作為舉例，意思就是，他們可能會不惜一次送出三個prospects把山大王交易過來。
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