Willie Randolph

The New York Yankees have had an eventful offseason despite not making any major splashes, yet there is still some work to do.

They have already found Derek Jeter's successor in Didi Gregorius, traded for young starter Nathan Eovaldi, re-signed third baseman Chase Headley, brought in reliever Andrew Miller and made a handful of other smaller moves, so it has not exactly been quiet on the Yankees' front.

    Just when you think you've seen it all, almost every season a player on the New York Mets makes headlines for a surprising off-the-field issue.  The multitude of inappropriate actions and embarrassing behavior by the team feels more like a soap opera than a professional baseball organization.

    While the New York Yankees perennially grace the cover of local newspapers for winning championships, the Mets created news over the years with locker-room brawls, drug scandals and throwing fireworks into a crowd of fans.

Normally when a new manager is hired in Major League Baseball, his first task is to assemble his own coaching staff, but in the case of Don Mattingly and the Los Angeles Dodgers, things may be a bit more complicated than they look.

It remains a heated debate. If Billy Wagner had stayed healthy in 2008, are the Mets the team winning the division, winning the World Series, and spending the next four months bashing their division rivals?

While it is all speculation and hypothetical, there is valid evidence to support that had Billy Wagner kept his arm intact, the Mets would have proceeded to win the NL East. That aspect of the question remains plausible.

How much longer is Mr. Wilpon going to deal with Omar Minaya as the general manager of the Mets? What will it take for him to realize that he is the wrong man to be running this franchise?

Take a step back a couple of seasons. Minaya's bullpen wears down and the Mets collapse to finish off the 2007 season by losing 12 of their last 17 games and missing the postseason.

The Mets have a very potent offense, no question, but most of the hitters are extremely streaky, especially the heart of the lineup and this is a concern for the fans and for Mets management.

Howard Johnson is the hitting coach and was spared the late night firing that Willie Randolph and Rick Peterson received in Anaheim last June.