Omar Minaya Quotes (90 Quotes)

There's always a positive when you have your players in your camp. I think Pedro is disappointed. But for us to have him in camp, that's fine, too.

We're leaving it to the player. He wants to make sure he's 100 percent before he's ready to go.

One of our goals this offseason was to acquire a big bat for the middle of our lineup. Carlos Delgado certainly fits that description. He'll be a superb fit for our lineup.

I think it's as good a bullpen as you're going to get in the National League.

I think it's a great opportunity for Gary. He did a great job with the Gulf Coast team.

We'll let his performance dictate all that. I think we'll probably have to pull him back a little bit at first. A lot of young guys want to get right after it ... We're not in the business of rushing young pitchers.

We have full trust in Pedro. I think he wants to play, and he's going to do everything he can to play. But he is very understanding of the bigger issues. We're confident he'll be OK as far as the season goes. He's not going to risk his career or his year for the sake of playing.

Matsui's got to go out there and play. It's not that Matsui has the job won. You try to say that Matsui last year had an off year. He was injured part of the year, and I think if you ask Willie today, there's a competition out there.

One of the reasons we brought him in this spring is his passion. His passion is something that's contagious.

I don't know if he could rebound. It's worth a chance. We're signing him to a minor-league contract. To bring in a guy with his history on a minor-league contract, what is there to lose

We try to send them home and make sure the trainer and medical staff monitors the stuff as soon as possible.

There's a plan in place here. What you have here is a couple of young guys who have to learn how to play the game. Our bench can pick us up. ... What these guys bring to the party I think is important.

The key thing with Mike is to communicate and we did that, ... He's gracefully done everything we've asked.

He moved himself up. With the way he's pitched velocity-wise, command-wise and strikeout-to-walk ratio, he basically moved himself up.

We have to ask ourselves, are two starts in September worth it We have to look at the big picture. Of course, we'd all like to see him pitch. But we have to be wise about it.

There's a lot of passion for the World Cup. (Major-league players) playing in the international market is a little new to us in the States.

We were born with baseball in our blood. It's more than just a sport. It's a passion. It's an opera. It's just a way of being. It's almost like breathing.

I hope somebody gives Sammy a chance to play, because I think he can still play and help a team. I hope Sammy doesn't retire, because he's done a lot of good things for the game. For us, though . . . he's not a good fit.

You have to be impressed with how he pitches. You have to be impressed with his delivery, his velocity and his command. ... I think the entire industry felt he was the best college pitcher out there.

We just thought he needed an opportunity to play. If we don't trade Cameron, we don't get Delgado, so we thought we had to go for a young, up-and-coming guy that could give us numbers close to Cameron at a much lower rate. We're very happy how it turned out.

When all is said and done with Beltran, we're being conservative. It's April. We want to have him for four or five months. Fortunately, we're off to a good start, so that allows us to be conservative.

We have to look at the big picture, and we have to be wise in how we handle not only him but any player, ... The big picture is we want Pedro pitching for us the next couple of years.

Not really. I don't think about it much. It's a promotional night, and baseball now is so diverse no matter where you go, you don't think much about that. It's just another promotion night.

You never know. If that need came up, we thought Darren could give us more innings than Pedro.

Any time these guys come up, it's always outing to outing.

I think the fans connect with the younger guys. They know that, in the age of free agency, these guys are going to be around for the next four or five years. That's the goal.

I'm not saying we're going to bring Mike Pelfrey up, but I can't say that we won't. We usually are conservative, but a player like this, with so much ability, can come very fast.

I just froze. I was speechless, felt awful. My heart was pounding. I was scared for the guys.

Surgery would have kept him out a week, maybe 10 days, maybe two weeks. Without surgery, he might be able to play tomorrow.

This guy really cares about winning. I'm a little biased, even though he was just born in Brooklyn ... I like players from New York.

My policy is one that if a team wants to talk about a player, I'm willing to listen.

Players are able to play at an older age than they were before and I think Julio Franco personifies that. I think we are going to see athletes play on into the middle 40s, especially in baseball.

I'm not closing the door on Mike Piazza.

We're still in February. We still have so much time to go. If we were to be in a stage like this at the middle of March, it would be a different story. I'm not concerned. He can pitch with this. He pitched with it last year and went through some pain. What we want to do is be able to correct it.

We have a lot of arms in camp. I'd rather have quality than quantity, but I believe we have quality.

There are guys that are special as far as longevity. The only way we were going to be able to get him here was for two years.

Billy Wagner helps because we blew a lot of games late in the eighth and ninth innings last year.

There are no geniuses in baseball. Some deals work, some don't. You just keep trying to make moves to improve the club.

The uncertainty that is in the air is going to be gone. It going to be like somebody is looking out for their interest. An owner can resolve their problems and help make the team better.

I was hoping it would be Baltimore he would go to, because the Marlins are in the same division, ... But all that does for us is make the challenge even bigger, and we have to work harder, because a team in our division just got better by getting this guy.

You have to understand, when you're in a big market with a city like New York, and you have families that love baseball 247, the last thing you want to be is irrelevant.

When it's all said and done, I thought they were all pretty close. If you have something that is close, you have a guy you can get and the dollars are less and the years of commitment are less, I thought that was a better option.

I felt we had to make sure we got the ball to Billy Wagner. The seventh and eighth innings are very crucial innings.

Xavier has the versatility to play first base, third base or the outfield, ... He's a young guy who we feel will get better and better with more playing time.

Part of being in New York is bringing in players that are name guys. Its part of business here. You have to be aggressive. You owe it to the fans to do the best you can to improve the team.

I don't have a timetable. But I will tell you I am encouraged by the way he threw today -- just the overall aggressiveness, the overall rhythm. We are still in the early days of March, so let's see how the whole month goes along.

He was dominating, pounding the strike zone with velocity over 90. But it wasn't so much the velocity but the command, velocity and the delivery.

The most important thing is for us to get out of there healthy. The second thing is to see if we can buy into the belief that we're all dependent on each other if we're going to win. We're going to have to win together, from top to bottom. To me, that's the goal.

I've told Julio that as long as I'm in the organization I think I want Julio Franco to be part of my organization. When Julio Franco sets a goal, he usually gets his goal.

We'll see what kind of shape he's in. There is no specific number of days.