As many have noted, the team's success in the last month means that it's unlikely that he's getting fired before August, and I suspect that he's not going to get fired at all, unfortunately.
I'm not going to say fire him at all, but that was a classic example of a manager trying to get his pitcher a win. It's easy to say it was nothing now, but at the time in the 5th, the Tigers were a SINGLE away from being right back in it. No hits, 10 run lead, doesn't matter to me. Even after the 4th when the Tigers got 2 runs and hit every ball hard, it was obvious that Niese should have been taken out.
FYI, Better baseball minds (Gary, Keith, and Ron) all unanimously agreed with Manuel's decision to keep Niese pitching, and all agreed that Jerry yanked him at the right time. (though it was mentioned that maybe a batter earlier would have sufficed). I'm not a fan of Manuel's, but You want to get Niese the win, especially as he was Lights Out the first 3 innings until the rain delay.
I wasn't watching the top of the 4th inning, but when they took off the tarp and Verlander wasn't pitching in the bottom of the 3rd, Gary asked Ron and Keith how long a delay there has to be for a manager to pull a pitcher. Both said one hour. The rain delay was 58 minutes, and then the Mets continued to bat for 24 minutes, making Niese's delay more than 80 minutes, far too long to put him back in, according to what they had just said. If they said anything different in the top of the 4th inning apparently they were just covering Manuel's ass, since they had said the exact opposite 30 minutes earlier. Maybe it would have been okay if the Mets went out quickly, but when the Mets kept scoring runs Manuel allowed his desire to get Niese the win win out over the sensible thing to do. He acknowledged the mistake after the game, by the way: http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/gametracker/recap/MLB_20100622_DET@NYM
It's always nice when in your most important fantasy league, you sit an OF who goes 4 for 6 with 3 runs scored and 4 RBI and one of your starting pitchers gets a 10-0 lead but only goes 4 and 2/3 innings.
It's a moot point as the Mets scored 4 more runs and won 14-6 Also, Ron and Keith both agreed that Jerry should try and let Jon go 5 and get him out, but when he couldn't get that last out, they both agreed it was a good decision to hook him when he did.
A Blue Jays/Rays/Yankees fan whackjob from Canada in my fantasy league posted this today- "I'm feeling Bonderman against the Mets he'll no hitter them for sure"
Reyes leads off for the Mets with a triple Oh well. So much for the prophesied no hitter. I thought we were going to see history tonight.
Wright doubles in a run. I'm tracking this and the College World Series and TCU is scoring at the same time, as if in tandem. Works for me. TCU scores, Mets score. TCU records an out, the Mets do as well.
Reyes is 3/3 with a single, triple, and homer. Two runs scored. He also has a steal. He's the most recent Met to hit for a cycle ('06). Now he'll have a shot at a second one.
Reyes is 21/49 over his last 11 games. BA up to .284. He was batting .238 at the end of April and .259 at the end of May.
What am amazing find Dickey has been for this team! Being a knuckleballer he might be with this team for long time, a Wakefield type of tenure!
Excellent at bat for Davis, as he singles in 2 after looking bad on a couple of pitches. 5-0 going to the 8th.
