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Willie deserves better from Jeff Wilpon

Wallace Matthews

June 16, 2008

And now, the dreadful charade goes on the road. Complete with all the false bravado, the curious bonhomie, the pre- and postgame interviews that seem more like a deathbed vigil over a body still very much alive, every question a variation on the same theme: "So tell us, Willie, how do you feel about your imminent demise?"

Willie Randolph has handled all of it with class and bravery and unusual good humor, which is a lot more than can be said about the man lurking in the shadows deciding his fate.

"I been in baseball a long time," he said before the Mets split a doubleheader with the Texas Rangers, leaving him in limbo for another day at least. "I know what it's about. It's about winning, man, winning ballgames. That's what I signed up for, and I'm man enough to deal with it."

If only the same were true of Jeff Wilpon, the man who thought trading Scott Kazmir for Victor Zambrano was a great idea and now sits back trying to find the courage to take a stand, any stand, on Randolph.

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"I've always encouraged [the owners] to come around and visit," Randolph said. "They choose not to."

Randolph said this not with anger or bitterness but with the resignation of a man who suddenly understands the breed of cat he is dealing with, the same way he has slowly come to grips with the character of his team.

These $140-million Mets are looking more and more like a one-run horse, and that run is now almost two years in the past. Someone has to take the fall and as always, the ready-made scapegoat is the manager.

Randolph's big mistake, it turns out, was his failure to understand the modern ballplayer, many of whom make more for one season than he made for an entire career but still need to be "motivated" by someone else. Randolph, in his own way more a self-made man than Fred Wilpon, thought he was coming here to be a manager, not a kennel-keeper. He arrived a grown man and expected to work with other grown men, in his clubhouse and the front office.

In both places, the Mets have let him down.

Especially Jeff Wilpon, who can neither pull the trigger on Randolph nor holster his weapon until the end of the season.

No one with the Mets has told Randolph he's in trouble, not to his face, anyway. He must read it in the papers, leaked through Wilpon's media lapdogs, hear it on the radio, discern it in the lukewarm votes of confidence from his general manager and the ominous inaccessibility of his bosses.

"Something must be going on," he said, "because no one's come down to tell me otherwise."

No man deserves to be put through what the Mets are putting Randolph through on a daily basis, and no manager can be expected to lead effectively when he can never be sure if the game he is managing will be his last. Yesterday, he introduced himself to Trot Nixon, the newest Met and you can just imagine the conversation: "Hello, I'm Willie and I'll be your manager tonight ..."

As for tomorrow, who knows?

Randolph came to the ballpark with his bags packed, prepared to leave with his team for a West Coast trip, but not at all sure he would actually wind up on the plane.

"I look forward to being on it, you know," he joked. "I don't know what scenario has to happen today, if I have to win one, or split, or win two. Or I might lose both and still be on the plane. We'll just see what happens."

When the Mets lost the first game, 8-7, after a rousing comeback fell short, his status remained in limbo. The rally indicated his team was still playing for him. But a loss was a loss, and the way the score is being kept seems to depend on who is keeping it. And if you were going to blame Randolph for the failure of his team, does he also get some credit for sending up Robinson Cancel to hit for Pedro Martinez in yesterday's nightcap - a move that was roundly booed until Cancel delivered the winning hit?

It doesn't have to be this way and it wouldn't be this way if the Mets had the decency, and the guts, to deal with Randolph the way Randolph deals with everyone else. But Jeff Wilpon, who has made a rise from non-entity in this town to first place among the idiot sons of rich fathers, seems to lack the capacity to display either.

As recently as last Monday, he could have put the issue to rest at a charity function in Connecticut the Wilpons dragged their weary team to after an all-night flight from San Diego, where they had just dropped four games to the Padres.

When asked by the New York Times for his opinion of the Mets' miserable road trip, and by extension, the status of his manager, Wilpon said: "I'm going to keep that to myself. Let's talk about the charity."

Randolph neither wants nor needs Wilpon's charity. But a little straight talk would be nice.