Mets Ink El Duque's Brother Livan Hernandez

The New York Mets have completed a one year minor league contract with the brother of former Met and Yankee Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez, Livan Hernandez, the Daily News reported Saturday.

Livan has been a target of GM Omar Minaya for a better part of the past two years through trade rumors, but now that Minaya gets his hands on a man who pitched for Minaya when the two were with the Montreal Expos in 2003 and 2004.

Hernandez earned the reputation as a big game pitcher after leading the Florida Marlins to the 1997 World Series title in Game Seven against the Cleveland Indians.

Hernandez is known as a versatile innings eater who usually gives his clubs 200 plus innings every season. The best season of Hernandez's career came back in 2000, when he was 17-11 with a 3.75 ERA with the San Francisco Giants.

Hernandez has not pitched as well lately. In 2007, he was 11-11 with a 4.93 ERA with the Arizona Diamondbacks. Last season Herandez split time with the Minnesota Twins and Colorado Rockies going 13-11 with a 6.05 ERA.

Hernandez will compete with Freddy Garcia, Jon Niese and Tim Redding for the Mets fifth spot in the rotation.