Buzz: The A’s and Mets, Part III
In a post to his blog for the Sporting News, Gerry Fraley explains how a coming move to a new stadium will impact A’s GM GM Billy Beane, who ‘has pitching to deal,’ such as RHP Joe Blanton and RHP Dan Haren.
According to Fraley…
“The Mets are a logical partner…Omar Minaya
cannot repeat this season’s mistake of giving manager Willie Randolph a rotation that was both too old and too young. The Mets need a top-end starter like Haren. The A’s have long coveted Mets center fielder Lastings Milledge.”
Meanwhile, at Gotham Baseball Magazine, citing ‘a West Coast baseball official,’ Mark Healey writes that to get Haren the Mets will have to part with at least John Maine, adding…
“I don’t see a deal between these two teams right now, but if Haren becomes available, it will be up to Omar to see if he wants to pull a trigger on a deal that will cost him Maine, and likely Lastings Milledge and Aaron Heilman as well. Is it worth it?”
…from what i can gather, beane and omar do not talk as often as we’d like to think, if they even talk at all…as i understand it, most of these ‘discussions’ occur between their assistants, who shuttle rough-sketch ideas back and forth on occasion…dating back to Barry Zito, the sense i repeatedly get is that the crux of any oakland-new york chit-chat will always center on milledge, and whether he is worth blanton, or whether he is worth more than blanton – and that’s where these ‘talks’ come to a stand still…
