they had ALREADY gotten phenomenally lucky with Barajas, and

1) given his age,
2) the fact that it gets hotter as the season goes on and that’s particularly tough on catchers,
and
3) that there was no reason whatsoever to think that Barajas would keep this up indefinitely, particularly not in his mid 30s

that Manuel and Minaya couldn’t figure out that they should take their winnings instead of being almost certain of giving back the gift they got, by playing Barajas into the ground.

This has been one of the great and chronic failings of Minaya as GM (and of Manuel as a manager), to simply take any advantage that luck gives you and make sure you create a situation in which you’re almost certainly bound to give it back, whether by re-signing old players and making sure that you pay for that last, ugly year of their careers, or by taking someone like Nieve and if he happens to give you a month of good, extremely durable pitching, keep sending him out there at an unsustainable pace until he is certain to break down.

It’s incredible is what it is.

in that tejada is 20 years old, dismal at the plate and should not be with the big club.

I think that the main criticism is that he has drunk the Mets Kool Aid and is a little too friendly with the team. I guess people see him almost as a branch of SNY, where folks are restricted from being highly and openly critical, even where it is clearly merited.

Is that like Binghamton for alcoholics?

My guess is that someone misinterpreted roster movement as Feliciano getting traded rather than getting called up to replace Barajas.

http://bit.ly/9qP7Fa