![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I posted this at: The Blair Wasdin Project, this small Red Sox board I read and rarely post on (this is post #4 for me). It seemed interesting enough to me to cross-post it here.
So ESPN.COM ran this story on how Minaya went to the San Juan to talk to Carlos Delgado, and how much his 'latino' connection helps him negotiate cause he understands these star Latino players.
ARTICLE LINK HERE
It includes such lines as:
"In his first visit to his native Puerto Rico since signing a seven-year, $119 million contract with the Mets on Tuesday, Beltran said the presence of two Latinos in New York's front office -- Minaya, who is Dominican, and his special assistant Tony Bernazard, a Puerto Rican -- gave the Mets a family appeal that made him lean toward the team."
and
"Minaya said knowing the importance of family and personal contact in Latin culture gave him the idea of visiting Puerto Rico to recruit Beltran. He used the same technique to lure Martinez into a $53 million, four-year deal.
"Maybe the intuition of me understanding the culture led me to our strategy of, 'Let's go a step further, let's go there,' " Minaya said."
Maybe I'm just some dumb white anglo-saxon protestant Jew, born in Salem, living currently in Minnesota, so I don't get it. But does this seem stupid to anyone else? I mean, he landed Martinez by adding an extra year and more money. He landed Beltran with more money, and the lure of playing with Martinez. Didn't JWH and Theo fly to the Dominican and meet with Pedro on the airport tarmac or something dramatic? Are there really GMs who, because they are dumb white guys, who have never thought of flying to someone's home when courting them? Who are they, and why haven't they been fired yet?
Yes - Minaya has done a good job of recruiting two star players, and may help the Mets achieve something respectable next year, at considerable cost.
Absolutely - a Latino player certainly would like the idea of working for fellow Latinos in the front office. It's a good step for baseball, and it's nice to see the slow progression of the Latinos in baseball, the african-americans in football and basketball (Joe Dumars comes to mind), slowing managing to move from the playing field to the front office.
But, in the end, it just seems to be the money, honey.
I even find the concept somewhat insulting - the way it's been reduced to (Minaya) "Hey, I'm a Latino, you're a Latino, we understand each other and should work together!" It's reduces a lot of complex issues of race and language in sports to a simple argument, and one I feel is fundamentally flawed in its reasoning.
Or maybe I just don't understand cause I'm a dumb white anglo-saxon protestant jew.
So ESPN.COM ran this story on how Minaya went to the San Juan to talk to Carlos Delgado, and how much his 'latino' connection helps him negotiate cause he understands these star Latino players.
ARTICLE LINK HERE
It includes such lines as:
"In his first visit to his native Puerto Rico since signing a seven-year, $119 million contract with the Mets on Tuesday, Beltran said the presence of two Latinos in New York's front office -- Minaya, who is Dominican, and his special assistant Tony Bernazard, a Puerto Rican -- gave the Mets a family appeal that made him lean toward the team."
and
"Minaya said knowing the importance of family and personal contact in Latin culture gave him the idea of visiting Puerto Rico to recruit Beltran. He used the same technique to lure Martinez into a $53 million, four-year deal.
"Maybe the intuition of me understanding the culture led me to our strategy of, 'Let's go a step further, let's go there,' " Minaya said."
Maybe I'm just some dumb white anglo-saxon protestant Jew, born in Salem, living currently in Minnesota, so I don't get it. But does this seem stupid to anyone else? I mean, he landed Martinez by adding an extra year and more money. He landed Beltran with more money, and the lure of playing with Martinez. Didn't JWH and Theo fly to the Dominican and meet with Pedro on the airport tarmac or something dramatic? Are there really GMs who, because they are dumb white guys, who have never thought of flying to someone's home when courting them? Who are they, and why haven't they been fired yet?
Yes - Minaya has done a good job of recruiting two star players, and may help the Mets achieve something respectable next year, at considerable cost.
Absolutely - a Latino player certainly would like the idea of working for fellow Latinos in the front office. It's a good step for baseball, and it's nice to see the slow progression of the Latinos in baseball, the african-americans in football and basketball (Joe Dumars comes to mind), slowing managing to move from the playing field to the front office.
But, in the end, it just seems to be the money, honey.
I even find the concept somewhat insulting - the way it's been reduced to (Minaya) "Hey, I'm a Latino, you're a Latino, we understand each other and should work together!" It's reduces a lot of complex issues of race and language in sports to a simple argument, and one I feel is fundamentally flawed in its reasoning.
Or maybe I just don't understand cause I'm a dumb white anglo-saxon protestant jew.
