the FO of recent years before Cashman's resigning was controlled in large part by the Tampa Bay faction who had no clue what they were doing and effectively removed the arrchitect of the 90's dynasty (Stick) from the Boss' inner circle. They were largely comprised of old blowhards who had a serious hard-on for the Mets and Red Sox. The bloated contracts and $200M payroll is proof of that as well as the acquisitons of RJ, Giambi, Brown, etc.
the FO, pre-Cashman reupping, lucked into a system and situation carefully built up from the ground by Stick and other good baseball people. Anything bad you have to say about them before 2005 I would completely agree with. You can change "seemed to have reacting to bostons efforts as opposed to developing a system of their own" to "They only knew how to OVERreact to bostons efforts as opposed to developing a system of their own"