GM Omar Minaya checked out of the Dolphin Hotel minutes ago, headed for the Dominican Republic to visit with the team's baseball academy there. Minaya completed one of the few trades here at this week's winter meetings -- sending Brian Bannister to the Royals for hard-throwing reliever Ambiorix Burgos. But he also mentined on the way out the door that he was deep into discussions with the White Sox before they traded Freddy Garcia to the Phillies late Wednesday night.
"We talked to them for a while," Minaya said. "We just couldn't get it done. We couldn't match up the prospects. [GM] Ken [Williams] said he wanted pitching."
The Phillies surrendered righthander Gavin Floyd and minor-league pitcher Gio Gonzalez for Garcia. But Minaya was reluctant to part with any of his big chips -- Mike Pelfrey and Philip Humber -- with Garcia headed for free agency after this season.
"These guys that are one year guys,"Minaya said, "you want to get guys you can control."
Comments (4)
Aghast as to, what appears to be an urgent need to get pitching We have young arms with a future. Where is Zembrano? Give our young players a chance to gain experience.
I guess I just dont see how losing Banny was a good deal. Sure Burgos is young and a flamethrower but the Mets need starters very badly and Bannister showed tremendous ability prior to getting hurt last year which im sure he could have bounced back from. So unless they see something in Burgos' delivery that they feel they can fix so his ERA is where it needs to be, seems to me we got the short end of the stick...
I agree with Omar on not dealing Pelfrey and Humber. Dont deal them...Bring them to Spring training and lets see what they got. Love to see both of them make the team.Sometimes the best deals are the ones you dont make.
IF PELFREY,HUMBER,AND PEREZ,VARGOS MAKE THE TEAM IT WILL MAKE THAT TEAM STRONGER GLAVINE CANT GO ON FOREVER NEITHER CAN EL DUKE YOU NEED YOUNG ARMS AS LONG AS THERE GOOD