Tony Tony Tony

Many Mets bloggers have opined on the Tony Bernazard situation, and we have been asked to do the same. I'm hesitant to do so; let me explain why. Over the last few years, I've read some negative things about Bernazard. I've never read anything positive about him. Based on my limited knowledge about Tony Bernazard's job performance, I'd say he should be fired. But, I have to acknowledge that my knowledge is very limited, and very small in comparison to the knowledge that the Wilpons and Omar Minaya have about Tony B. I blog about baseball and express opinions, but I try to limit my opinions to topics I have some knowledge about. When I criticize a trade, I do it based on information, even though I probably have a little bit less information than the Mets' front office. I don't have detailed scouting reports on Jeff Francoeur, but I do have access to data - Jeff Francoeur had played in over 630 Major League games at the time of the trade and there is extensive data available about how he has performed in those 630 games. I can see that he has performed very poorly, and based on the available data about every other player in MLB history, I know that it is extremely unlikely that a player who has performed as poorly as Francoeur over such a long period of time will suddenly perform well. Therefore, I'm willing to criticize the trade despite the small deficit in information.

With the Bernazard situation, I suffer from a huge deficit in information. Omar Minaya interacts with Bernazard on a regular basis and (I assume) has a much, much clearer idea of what exactly Bernazard's responsibilities are and how well he performs them. I have a few second-hand anecdotes and opinions. It seems to me that Bernazard brings little to the table, but it's possible that if I had a frank discussion with Minaya about it, he could quickly rattle off a list of valuable contributions Bernazard has made to the organization, as well as explanations for why the seemingly sorry state of the farm system isn't Bernazard's fault. And he might be able to tell me that what happened in Binghamton didn't go exactly as it's been portrayed in the Daily News.

I'll also note that it often seems that the Wilpons are overly concerned with how the media portrays the organization. Firing Bernazard would be portrayed positively by the press and give the organization a chance to publicly show that they're shaking things up. I think that's a stupid reason to fire him. If Bernazard has done a bad job, he should be fired. If his presence in the organization is destructive, he should be fired. It seems to me that he has done a bad job and is a destructive presence in the organization, but I'm basing my opinion on very limited information, so there's a decent chance I'm wrong.