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MLB WINTER MEETINGSDecember 10, 2008Omar MinayaMark ShapiroJack ZduriencikLAS VEGAS, NEVADA THE MODERATOR: Good evening, everyone, and thank you for coming back and joining us tonight. As you are obviously aware by now, we've had a three-team trade. In the interest of deadline pressure, we'll have a brief opening statement from each of our three general managers. We'll take a couple questions from the floor and then we'll come on down and break back into the one-on-ones. With that, obviously you know everybody up here. Jack, do you want to start? JACK ZDURIENCIK: We're here to announce a 12-player trade, but before I do that, I want to thank very much the two gentlemen to my left. They were terrific through this whole process. This thing went on for a few weeks as we had different discussions involving many players, and a few of the players that we lose in our deal were discussed with other ballclubs. But Mark was terrific in how he handled this, and the conversations we had were nothing but classy. I spoke with Omar, and then, with Omar's experience and his professionalism and the times that we sat together, he was tremendous. As this thing unfolded, the three of us kind of put our heads together and said to Omar some things that I felt and Omar said some things to Mark and the next thing you know we are on the phone together and here we are with a 12-player trade. We acquired a center fielder, Franklin Gutierrez; Aaron Heilman, a right-handed pitcher; Endy Chávez, the center fielder; we got Jason Vargas, a left-handed pitcher; Mike Carp, the first baseman; Ezequiel Carrera, center fielder; and Maikel Cleto, an outfielder -- or right-handed pitcher, I'm sorry. With all that being said, what our goals were in Seattle were to try to upgrade the talent level to try to help our ballclub immediately and long-term, and in doing this, with acquiring this many players, we think that we've taken a step in that direction. So we do feel that we've added players to our ballclub that are going to fill some needs. We also shored up our Minor League system and taken some players that we think are going to be players that will contribute for years to come. Again, thank you to both you guys. My first trade as a general manager, and I guess you could say it's an honor to work with these two guys. Thank you. OMAR MINYANA: Thanks a lot, Jack, and congratulations on your first trade. I've been there before, and I know that feeling. We go way back to scouting days, and you're right, you guys got all the names, and then Mark, and this was a trade that took some time to get done, but like most trades, the next thing you know, we really came together this afternoon when Jack pretty much told me, hey, look, if you can get me this guy for this guy, and placed a call to Mark, and then it happened. Best thing I can say about this trade, guys, is it's an old-fashioned trade. Here we are in the year 2008 and talking about millions of dollars, and this is how trades were done, just pure baseball trade. To credit Jack, to your staff, to credit Mark, to your staff, and I want to credit my staff in getting this done. This is the second time that we've done a trade from our Minor Leagues. We gave up a lot of players. I know that I still have so much confidence in our scouting and our development and our international scouting. This touched all the areas of our organization, and we would not be able to do the Santana trade, we would not be able to do this trade without the players in our system, and that's a credit to all our scouts and everybody that works for us, and with our new academy in the Dominican Republic I feel even more comfortable that we're going to have the players to get these things done. And as far as the Mets fans are concerned, all I kept hearing the streets in New York -- if you go get bagels in the morning, it was, Please, address the bullpen. Well, to you Mets fans, we've addressed the bullpen by getting Mr. Putz in. He will work hard and continue to fulfill our team. Thank you for -- you guys, it's an honor to work with you guys. Thanks. MARK SHAPIRO: You can tell a guy that didn't expect to make an announcement because he didn't pack a sports coat. We're obviously the smaller part of the trade, but I'd echo what these guys said. It's hard to put together what you think of at the inception is a win-win-win trade. We sat back and looked at this thing and there's a lot of moving parts and I think everybody satisfied what they needed to get done, and I hope a year from now we're sitting here and this was a great trade for everyone. As far as our part of this goes, I think it was able to come together because of -- Omar and I talked so frequently, we pretty much know each other's needs. From the time Jack got the job, Jack was familiar with our players already. It was a natural conversation, very straightforward conversation. It was direct and that's how constructive conversations happen. We have very good depth in our outfield and we've got to be creative in how we fill our needs. We're trading a guy we think is going to be a very good Major League center fielder, but we have a pretty good center fielder in Grady Sizemore, so he's got more value to someone else that would give him a chance to play center field than he does to us, and we have a chance to fill a need in our bullpen with Joe Smith. We think he can contribute right away. We'd be happy to have him contribute the way he did for Omar and the Mets. And Valbuena, a guy that just satisfied a glaring need in the upper levels of our system and in time we hope can be a contributor in our middle infield. Again, it really did come together remarkably quickly with a lot of back lay work leading up to it. But it came together quick this afternoon. Q. This is a question for Jack. During his time with the Mets, Aaron Heilman didn't make (indiscernible) and would like to be given his chance as a starter. Are you going to be giving that opportunity to him and do you see that as possible role in 2009? JACK ZDURIENCIK: I think that's possible. I think what we'll do is in spring training we'll see what Don's slots are with his staff. I don't think at this moment in time I would say this is exactly what his role is. I do think he's an experienced Major League pitcher and he's going to contribute to this ballclub and we're happy to have him. THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much. End of FastScripts |
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