The Mets fired Manager Willie Randolph very early Tuesday morning. Randolph led the Mets to mediocrity this season, a year after faltering down the stretch with the NL East lead, allowing the Phillies to win the division on the last day.
Bench Coach Jerry Manuel will take over as manager. Pitching Coach Rick Peterson and First Base Coach Tom Nieto were also dismissed.
The news came at 3:15 a.m.
I feel pretty bad for Randolph, especially given the time of the dismissal. They couldn’t do it at 9 a.m.? Randolph aside, the move and the timing of it shows General Manager Omar Minaya is trying to send a cold message to the rest of his team. But how will the Mets respond?
Well, speaking of responses, Matt Cerrone at MetsBlog.com “feels dirty” being a fan the way the whole thing went down. He says he’s being mocked by fans of other teams for the dismissal:
“Nevertheless, the Mets took so long to make this decision that it made them look foolish, classless and disorganized.”
They needed a shakeup, absolutely, but was Randolph the right fall guy? I don’t think so.
Tim MalcolmTim first found the Phillies as a little infant at Veteran’s Stadium, cheering on a Juan Samuel game-winning home run in his very first game. With the pinstripes in his blood, he witnessed Terry Mulholland’s 1990 no-hitter, “Steve Carlton Night” at the Vet, game three of the 1993 World Series, countless games during the charmed 2008 championship season and various road excursions. Since November 2007 Tim’s been writing about them daily at Phillies Nation, becoming one of the world’s most popular Phillies scribes. You can catch him on Twitter and Facebook, as well. When he’s not talking about the Phils he’s relaxing with a St. Bernardus ABT 12 or one of his many favored brews.
