Soon we will enter June, but in the final beautiful days of May, I sense a calmness in the New York area. For the Mets have started to win.The streak is modest, to be sure; three game winning streaks should be commonplace for good teams. But these are Willie's Mets. Willie Randolph, who many fans thought would be fired this week, has survived so far and has his team looking more stable (albeit at the .500 mark) than they've looked since banging the Yankees ... my goodness, was it only two weeks ago!
As coincidence would have it, Willie's former colleague, Joe Torre, was back in New York as well, his Dodgers competing against the Mets, which allowed for an interesting article to appear in the New York Times. Harvey Araton, in his column, noted that the Yankees weren't quite as whiny when Torre was being insulted last fall as was being remembered this spring.
Araton writes:
Last October, Mike Mussina said of Torre, “If we don’t perform, it shouldn’t be a reflection on his ability.” Johnny Damon said: “We’re not just playing for him. We’re playing for a bunch of players in there.” ... Alex Rodriguez was too busy opting out and begging back in to worry about a manager. Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera were supposedly factoring Torre into their free-agent strategy, but the Yankees substituted an alternate Joe (Girardi) along with keys to the Steinbrenner vault. The band played on.
And the Mets fan looks at the standings, recognizes that the team is 3.5 games out of first place after taking two of three from the first-place Marlins (who are on their own three game losing streak), and says "Ok, Willie's safe for now. But don't let it happen again!"
We're fickle, we Mets fans.
As I've said to fellow Mets fans, who else is there right now? Short of importing Bobby Valentine from Japan, I don't think the Mets have a clear option that's better than -- or more importantly different from -- Willie. Jerry Manuel was a decent manager in Chicago (Cammy, Frank, correct me if I'm wrong), but his casual approach eventually allowed the players to get lazy. Laziness and complacency are killing the Mets. As for other options that have been voiced: Ken Oberkfell (Mets AAA manager) might have the chops, I really don't know; Gary Carter shot himself in the foot, which he'd already shoved in his mouth; Jim Fregosi doesn't impress me; and Tom Kelly is too smart to leave retirement for the New York circus.
I'd love to hear other people suggest other managers for the Mets, because I'm not convinced Willie's going to remain regardless of this little winning streak.
What I'd really love to see are Carlos Delgado and Carlos Beltran start to hit like they used to, Luis Castillo demonstrate why Omar lavished millions on him this past winter, and the pitching staff to work consistently and well into the latter third of the game. Is that too much to ask of a "championship-calibre team"?
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