Today, SI.com reported, and the New York Post’s Joel Sherman confirmed via twitter, that Jeff Wilpon gave Omar Minaya and Jerry Manuel votes of confidence two weeks ago. You see, with all the injuries, this disasterpiece can’t be blamed on the two guys at the helm. It’s just the way the hamstring tears, you see.

I call shenanigans.

At least when talking about Omar Minaya, there shouldn’t be a vote of confidence applied. And you may be surprised, because I’m not talking about the offense. When you lose men both young (Jose Reyes), middle-aged (Carlos Beltran), and old (Carlos Delgado), you’ve got some bad mojo going. You’re not going to trade Reyes just because he’s had some hamstring injuries in the past. In Beltran’s case, there was little precedent to think that he was breaking down. He’s only 32, and he’s played an average of 149 games since coming to the big city, and though he’s had some tweaks here or there, there’s hardly been a pattern that Minaya should have worried about. Carlos Delgado – well, Delgado was supposed to be backed up by promising young Daniel Murphy, wasn’t he?

No, a team with Alex Cora and Daniel Murphy as the primary reserves on offense seems like it could actually well-built, if a little weak against lefties. From Reyes down to Delgado, the lineup was supposed to be good, and in any other year, might still be. But is that the case with the pitching staff? Decidedly not.

Omar Minaya built a bad starting rotation. There, I said it. It was bad, and it was all based on his obsession with mediocre (but ‘tested,’ oh, there tested!) veterans. The staff had all the makings of a Minaya staff, which is to say that it was top-heavy, veteran-heavy, and had virtually no depth.

Some of the depth he sacrificed in order to get a reigning Cy Young winner in Johan Santana, but Philip Humber and Deolis Guerra probably wouldn’t be helping right now anyway. That seal of a trade was the last good thing he did for this staff.

He inexplicably followed up a good signing (Francisco Rodriguez) with a poor trade in getting JJ Putz. Putz, in 2008, showed a disturbing lack of control (BB/9 over 5, career BB/9 of 3.14) that, mixed with his injury issues that limited him to 47 games with mediocre results, did not make him a good candidate to be the setup man in New York. Hindsight is 20-20 so we’ll give him a pass for JJ Putz. And the fact that he decided to build the rest of the bullpen with young guys and cheap veterans – that was good thinking. Relief pitchers are notoriously fickle, and their production varies too much from year to year to pass out $5 million per year contracts to left-handed specialists. At least Minaya seems to understand that much.

However, let’s get back to that rotation. That rotation is a mess. Why does the team have so much confidence in Mike Pelfrey? I hate to keep harping on it, but I’ve written about how he has one pitch, and uses it too often. If he doesn’t develop a secondary or tertiary pitch, then he’s bullpen material. He’s certainly not a number 2. And yet it was obvious the team was depending on Big Pelf to come through this year. Even in his breakout season last year, he struck out less than five a game. That’s below-average, folks. That’s not a number 2 guy.

John Maine could be a number two, but you can’t depend on him either, not coming off of a year where he tallied 11 starts, had surgery, and showed declining strikeout rates combined with ballooning walk rates. No, Maine was depth: a guy that should have been penciled in as a #4/5 or 6.

The biggest mistake of Minaya’s career was signing Oliver Perez for 3 years and $36 million when one more year would and $24 million more have netted him Derek Lowe. I think it’s obvious that he chose poorly. Yes, Lowe is older. But Lowe has been a better pitcher every year of his career, and when you need a #2, you go get him. When you are the Mets, you don’t settle for a guy that has walked almost five batters per game his whole career, and is called the ‘little girl with the curl’ by the local media (when he’s good, he’s very good, but when he’s bad…).

Think how much better this team would be with even Lowe and his currently unexciting 4.40/1.40 steady hand behind Santana’s. Suddenly, we’re talking about Livan Hernandez as a #5 again, where he belongs. And we’re not talking about Livan as the second-best starter on the Mets currently. That mind-blowing fact is on Omar Minaya’s head.