The Mets have hired former Blue Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi as Special Assistant to the General Manager.

Ricciardi, if you’ll recall, once ripped Adam Dunn on talk radio, claiming that he “doesn’t really like baseball that much.” Then he said he called Dunn and apologized, but Dunn denied ever speaking to Ricciardi. Ricciardi maintained that the person on the other end of the phone said he was Adam Dunn and said, “That’s quite a prank to pull.” All this is available on Ricciardi’s Wikipedia page.

On the upside, he put together a decent young core of pitching talent in Toronto that didn’t really take hold until after he was fired at the end of the 2009 season.

Ricciardi played infield in the Mets’ system for two seasons in the early 1980s. He told reporters he had a standing offer from Theo Epstein to join the Red Sox front office, but decided to join the Mets when Sandy Alderson got the job. He said he hopes to bring the Mets to where the Red Sox are (in the organizational sense, not moving them to Boston). He stressed the importance of building a farm system through the draft and international scouting.

He said he’s excited to work for a team with the resources that the Mets have.