Bill Madden’s piece this morning illustrates the significant change in direction they took on this winter. Its becoming more and more clear that Tony Bernazard’s Rasputin-like hold was realized last year by Jeff Wilpon and he has quite frankly taken over on personnel matters. He’s done well.

Madden does a good job in pointing to the value and experience of newcomers like Wally Backman and Bob Melvin. Terry Collins has taken over as coordinator of minor league operations. Tim Teufel has been promoted to AA. What Madden left out were the intangibles, the most important of which is leadership and where it comes from.

Bernazard was a centralized control freak who had grasped control of far too many parts of the organization, including intricate on field details. As spring training unfolds, uniformed field managers and coaches will be providing the leadership. Motivation and instruction will come from them and not from someone like Bernazard. Players will rightfully feel that they are playing for a manager, not some omnipresent threatening force.

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John Harper revealed that Tony Bernazard made the entire organization emhasize hitting the ball the other way. The grip this man had on the Mets continues to amaze me.

The fact that he could control a major league manager’s philosophy like that is surprising. The minors, yes. But not at the major league level. Why Omar Minaya let him get away with it is beyond me. But the fact that he did shows that Bernazard was out of control and had the Wilpon’s snowed.

Organizational moves since Bernazard’s departure indicate that Jeff Wilpon is taking a bigger role. Minaya did not want Wally Backman, but he’s back now. The philosophical change could have only been prompted by Wilpon. Recruitment of Mets alumni from the 1980′s seems to be ongoing. Maybe they finally realize that having these guys around is a good thing.

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The new car smell is long gone. The excitement of a new love has calmed to content. Or something like that. And Fernando Martinez comes to his third big league spring training.

For a change, timing couldn’t be any better for Martinez. Not only is he not supposed to make the club, the Mets don’t want him to. The departure of Tony Bernazard has allowed the Mets to put a more realistic spin and plan in place for their Latin prospects. One cannot discount the drama that surrounded the Mets since Bernazard’s ouster as over shadowing the slow progress and health concerns of the Mets’ top prospect.

But Martinez quietly went about having a very good winter and will arrive in Florida next week without either fanfare and questions about making the club. Let alone starting.

Maybe now Martinez gets to come to camp to just play. If his body is still maturing, we can hope that his injury troubles are behind him. Some things need to go well for Martinez, but he will be able to do so this spring without past expectations and fascination.

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Flores is considered to be one of the crown jewells of the Mets organization. According to this scouting service, his game has lots of holes. Could it be that Flores’ reputation came from the over hyping of latin prospects that came during the Tony Bernazard regime?

Met’s minor league prospect guru, Mack Ade, rates Flores at number three. Toby Hyde lists him 2nd.

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Critcism of the Mets ventured to the absurd this morning when John Harper – a fellow who should know better – suggested the Mets missed Tony Bernazard. In a strange, sort of need his agressive way…way.
Bart Hubbuch was more subtle in calling Minaya “blindly optimistic.” What in the wide, wide world of sports do they expect? That Omar be “hysterically pessimistic?”

The press corps had their Minaya meltdown this summer and are looking for the Baker Act option.

Nonsense.

This most clear assessment of conditions on the ground came from another Harper column earlier this week when he correctly observed that the Mets were never in the running for anybody. They want to be playing in October and do not want to be part of a bad situation.

With this set of cards, the smart play is first realize there is indeed a core of top players already on the roster and that there’s a fair pool of free aganet talent to mine to improve the club.

In the mean time, the Mets realize that they are a target rich environment for bad press.

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We just worked out in the weight room in the morning. First day in pads started at 5pm. Its hat and mumid then, but it quickly seems to become a very pleasant afternoon here in the Florida panhandle. We found this out last spring and we found it was a really good bridge to the 3pm workouts that will occur when school begins.

Practice was spirited. Only one injury – a slightly sepretade shoulder. Naturally, it had to be an offensive lineman again. We’ve liklely lost one for the season. The back-up center is out for three to four weeks with a bad ankle sprain. I’m worried about one who has a bruised sternum. We’ll get one back Monday. He’s been out with a virus.

Its always a great debrief at the end of practice when the coaches get together to talk about practice. Terrific bonding occurs during those meetings when the good, the bad and ugly is shared with great humor and openness. No one’s opinion is ridiculed – a leasson the Mets should taken about Tony Bernazard in meetings. Our head coach has terrific organization skilsl, loves these meetings and does everything he can to foster such relationships.

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Baseball America listed Savannah Sand Gnats right-hander on its Prospect Hot Sheet:

Signed out of the Dominican in ’07, just a few months after Jenrry Mejia, Familia has emerged as ace of the low Class A Savannah staff. The 19-year-old righty lacks polish, but his low- to mid-90s fastball already rates as plus-plus, according to one scout for an AL club. The reason: Familia has exceptional life on and command of the pitch, a combination that’s rare for such a young pitcher. His changeup his is second-best offering for now, and he’ll need to refine his breaking ball to make it as a starter. On the season, Familia has gone 9-6, 2.90 in 20 starts for the Sand Gnats. Over 118 innings, he has stuck out 97, walked 40 and allowed just 94 hits (three home runs).

Toby Hyde rated Familia as the 27th ranked Mets prospect at the beginning of the season. Says Hyde:

Familia ranks here on the basis of a nice pitcher’s frame and a fastball that boasts average to plus MLB velocity already. Familia, despite inconsistent velocity, consistently threw strikes. In his first start of the year, Familia was throwing 93, 94 mph while that was down to 89-92 in his second appearance. The previous fall, scouts reported that he was consistently in the mid-90s. Familia’s off-speed stuff, a slider at 78 mph and a change at 84 are both about as far away from MLB caliber as one might expect from a 19-year old.

It will be interesting to see if the Mets promote Familia to AA. The firing of Tony Bernazard may have left a decision making vacuum. One theory is to let young players have a season of success that they can build upon. This is a extremely defensible position. If Familia has the goods, he’ll make the AA staff in spring training next year.

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…and bring up the player that Tony Bernazard wanted to fight. Luis Castillo, a man maligned has done everything the Mets asked and needed this year. No small wonder he sprained his ankle accidentally in the dugout. The Mets are going nowhere and should take this opportunity to call up 2B prospect Jose Coronado from AA. Lets see if he can play.

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Admittedly something has changed for me over the last week and I’ve been blogging about the Mets. And blogging alot ….and exclusively about them. I long ago lost the majority of folks who read my blog for baseball or Mets stuff when I plunged into politics. No doubt my right wing take turned many off. It was a plunge I took with my eyes wide open.

I know exactly when things changed for me. Adam Rubin’s stories about Tony Bernazard’s reign of terror throughout the organization during his tenure angered me. When Tom Romano told me two years ago about his run in with Bernazard it alerted me that things might not be going well with my old team. Willie Randolph’s demise and the whispers that came out in the media about Bernazard’s clubhouse meddling further signaled to me that this man was a dangerous force in the organization. The story of the abuse of the Binghampton club and the verbal assault on a front office colleague was my own final straw.

Bernazard was a tyrant and it was clear that he ruled by fear and intimidation. I just couldn’t believe that the Wilpons were either unaware or gave tacit approval to Bernazard’s management style. Either are unacceptable. They have some serious self assessment to do. Sadly it needs to begin with Omar Minaya’s dismissal and an overhall of baseball operations from bottom to top.

When I visited Port St. Lucie in 2006 I found myself drawn to the minor league complex and often spent most of the day there, only going back to the stadium to watch the game. Jay Horwitz had made the clubhouse off limits to me so I really couldn’t go there much. So I got to meet alot of the minor league staff and players. I realized just how much in common I had with them and how I identified with them as much as anyone. It was guys like them whom a bad actor like Bernazard would prey on.

I knew what kind of atmosphere that Bernazard must have been fostering. And yes, it did affect the major league club, too. One only need to realize that Francisco Rodriguez stood up to Bernazard in front of the whole team on the bus. Bernazard had entrenched himself in a way that it would take a player of that stature to take the bully on.

But the Wilpons and Minaya had to know how Bernazard operated and never lifted a finger until Rubin’s story broke. Maybe that’s what really behind Minaya’s shoot the messanger tact with Rubin. If Rubin hadn’t made Bernazard’s story public, he wouldn’t have had to fire him.

Worst for me is that this whole episode leaves the impression that the Mets are an organization that doesn’t treat its people well. It’s a curious combination of displeasure and desire. I can’t stand how things are going and badly want to see them do better.

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He probably could have, but being the pure baseball man that he is, Minaya served the club well by not forcing something to get a useful big league player in. Like it or not, the Mets realize that they will not be in the playoffs this season and kept thier chips.

My whole problem with Omar and the Wilpons is that they did not know just how cancerous Tony Bernazard was. Sadly the only way that the Wilpons can demonstrate it is to let Minaya go at the end of the year. As both Omar and Jeff Wilpon served as Bernazard’s enabler, the club’s future direction is in doubt as long as Minaya remains and Jeff Wilpon doesn’t further answer for Bernazard.

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