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New York Mets officially signed general manager Omar Minaya to a three-year contract extension through the 2012 season on Thursday.
The deal also contains club options for the 2013 and 2014 seasons.
"I'd like to thank ownership for this continued opportunity and their trust and confidence in me and our staff to achieve the results our organization and fans want," said Minaya. "In failing to reach our goal of a championship, we're already are hard at work in evaluating every aspect of our club to improve it. We believe we are on the right track with a strong core of players on our major league club and our minor league player development efforts."
Since taking over the Mets in 2005, Minaya has taken the team to the National League Championship Series in 2006 and signed some marquee free agents, including Pedro Martinez and Carlos Beltran. He has also added current Mets players Billy Wagner, Carlos Delgado and Endy Chavez during his tenure.
Despite going to the NLCS in 2006, the team collapsed at the end of 2007, blowing a seven-game advantage in its last 17 games. In the following offseason, Minaya worked a trade with the Twins for two-time Cy Young Award winner Johan Santana.
The 2008 season did not come without controversy, however, as Minaya made the decision to fire manager Willie Randolph, as the team was mired in third place despite the second-highest payroll in baseball. The team promptly went on a surge under interim manager Jerry Manuel but faltered down the stretch again and failed to make the playoffs.
"While we've made some progress, we still have a lot of work to do," said Jeff Wilpon, COO of the Mets. "Coming up a game short the last two seasons is incredibly frustrating and disappointing. The entire baseball operations staff is evaluating our shortcomings from top to bottom to see what we're missing so that we can get into the postseason in 2009. This contract extension reinforces our confidence in Omar's leadership in the short and longer term."
Before coming to the Mets, Minaya was the general manager for the former Montreal Expos from 2002-2004. Despite being owned by the other 29 major league baseball teams and having a limited payroll, Minaya was able to lead the team to two 83-79 records before the team moved to Washington.
After his playing career ended, Minaya served as a scout for the Texas Rangers from 1985 until the mid-1990s, when he joined the Mets' staff. He worked himself all the way up to assistant general manager behind Steve Phillips before leaving in 2002 to take the GM job with Montreal.
