General managers of successful teams are lining up, and they’re not in a bread line or an unemployment line.
A baseball official said Tuesday night Omar Minaya will soon reach agreement with the Mets on a new contract for five or six years, Brian Cashman will re-up with the Yankees for more than $2 million a year and Theo Epstein will conclude a new deal with the Red Sox, also for more than $2 million a year.
The Cashman and Epstein contracts will expire after this season, but Minaya has one year left on a five-year contract.
Cashman, as recently as Sunday, said he and the Yankees would talk after the season but that he had not decided what he wanted to do. But the baseball official told murraychass.com that they have been talking and were close to an agreement on a new contract that will pay Cashman more than the approximately $2 million a year he has been making, the official said.
The official said Epstein and the Red Sox have basically reached agreement on terms, including a salary of more than $2 million a year, but that they have some other matters to resolve, some elements that Epstein is seeking.
Minaya, the official said, will sign a new contract for five or six years, not for four years as has been reported elsewhere, when he and the Mets finish their negotiations after the season. Minaya’s salary will not be as high as the salaries of Cashman and Epstein, but it might have been had the Mets reached the playoffs last year and not collapsed in the season’s final 17 games.
Although talk had been circulating that Minaya could be in trouble if the Mets didn’t make the playoffs again this year, he was never in trouble, the official said, adding that the Mets and Minaya have been discussing a new contract for a long time.
Dave Dombrowski of the Detroit Tigers is believed to be the highest paid general manager at a salary of about $2.5 million, but he also has points in the Tigers ownership. Billy Beane of Oakland also has ownership points.
Cashman, who at 31 years old was the second youngest major league general manager ever, is completing his 11th season as Yankees general manager. This is the first of those 11 years that the Yankees won’t be in the playoffs.
When the Red Sox named Epstein their general manager in November, 2002, he was one month shy of his 29th birthday, making him the youngest general manager ever. The Red Sox won the World Series twice in his first five years in the position. Epstein is also the first Red Sox general manager to oversee five post-season teams.
Minaya, who had been the Montreal Expos general manager, joined the Mets in that position Sept. 30, 2004. He turned the Mets into a contender by acquiring such players as Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado and Johan Santana.