On the Mets beat

I'll let you in on a little secret: I got sick of the Duaner Sanchez story at about 1:30 p.m. today. It hit me all of a sudden as I was finishing my third story in three days about the Mets' tardy reliever.
I mean, Sanchez getting kicked out of camp by Willie Randolph is a big story, and I believe Newsday gave it the appropriate play the last three days. If you read the coverage you know this is about more than Sanchez being late a few times: the Mets brass was fed up with his lackadaisical attitude toward the rehab of his right shoulder, and so were his teammates. What the Mets did was totally correct.
Where I started to get sick of the story was when I started to think about Sanchez's role on the team. He's just not that important. Yes, he was lights out in the first half of last season, but relievers are often spotty from year to year, and I had doubts he will be as effective this season anyway. If he's slacking off on his rehab, then it will be even harder for him to handle the workload he had last season, when he was often used for more than one inning, and there's no guarantee he won't break down physically.
Omar Minaya is smart in knowing he has to stockpile bullpen arms. I don't know if Sanchez or Burgos or Sosa or Mota (after his drug suspension) or someone else will emerge as the eighth-inning complement to Heilman and Wagner, but I betcha someone will.