Lok out Jerry, they're gunning for you early, not that it will make a difference....... http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/13/sports/baseball/13mets.html?hpw Six Games In, and the Spotlight Is on the Mets’ Manuel By DAVID WALDSTEIN Published: April 12, 2010 It was in this city nestled, appropriately enough, in the Rocky Mountains, that Bobby Valentine, then the manager of the Mets, had an epic, emotional outburst in his office at the end of a 12-game losing streak in a deteriorating 2002 season. Barton Silverman/The New York Times Jerry Manuel Reacting to widespread speculation that he was trying to get himself fired, Valentine gave an unsolicited, impassioned defense of his actions during a postgame news conference and nearly broke down doing so. The outburst came on the night of Aug. 23, and the Mets had a 58-69 record at the time. Valentine kept his job, but only for six more weeks. When the season ended, with the Mets in last place, Valentine was gone, just two years after he took the team to the World Series. Eight years later, Mets Manager Jerry Manuel will be back in that same office Tuesday, perhaps facing questions about his own future, particularly after providing an unsolicited, and revealing, mea culpa on Sunday afternoon after his team was shut down and embarrassed by the aging and unimposing Livan Hernandez of the Washington Nationals. Critical baseball games do not usually exist in early April, but Sunday’s 5-2 loss seems to have taken on an afterlife that speaks to Manuel’s lack of job security as he tries to turn around a Mets team that had a miserable 2009 season filled with injuries and poor play. After Sunday’s game, Manuel took aim at the final pitching line against the soft-tossing Hernandez, who, after all, pitched for the Mets in 2009 and was not good enough to stick with the team the whole season. On Sunday, Hernandez’s line read seven innings, five hits, three walks, no runs. “We appeared unprepared,” Manuel said. “I take responsibility.” Manuel may have been trying to protect his players, who did little to help his cause over the first six games. Or perhaps he was being cagey, letting it be known that the players had not followed the game plan the coaching staff had laid out against Hernandez. Still, a manager rarely, if ever, uses the word “unprepared,” even someone like Manuel, who is generally uninhibited in his remarks to reporters. In this instance, he was either being startlingly honest or perhaps revealing some of the pressure he feels as a manager operating on a one-year contract and a lukewarm endorsement from the team’s chief operating officer, Jeff Wilpon. It was Wilpon, in remarks at the end of last season, who said that Manuel and General Manager Omar Minaya were under orders to show improvement in 2010, or face dismissal. One week, and six games, into the 2010 season, that improvement has yet to show itself. John Maine and Oliver Perez have each pitched once, and each looked no more effective than they did in spring training or last season. They make up two-fifths of the starting rotation. The team has no left-handed power except for Mike Jacobs, who batted cleanup for part of the first week, even though he is a backup player who was fortunate to make the roster. After six games, he is batting all of .133 and is already being booed. He will be presumably be pushed aside when Daniel Murphy returns from rehabilitating his twisted knee and reclaims the first-base job, but Murphy, although also left-handed, does not hit with much power. Carlos Beltran does, but he is still rehabilitating his surgically repaired knee, and no one on the Mets, including Manuel, knows when he is coming back. All Manuel does know is that his team had Jose Reyes back leading off on Sunday and that Washington was playing without its best player, third baseman Ryan Zimmerman, and that the Nationals won easily, anyway. And that his right fielder, Jeff Francouer, spoke of the team going through the motions against Hernandez. Manuel is usually poised in defeat and unlikely to ever have an outburst the way the more emotional Valentine did. Still, if the losses mount, he may quickly become a former Mets manager, the way Valentine did eight years ago.
I think it's likely that the Mets go into their series with the Atlanta Braves at 4-12, and that represents the only realistic opportunity for them to get on track, as they then face the Dodgers and Phillies. If Manuel makes it through the month, I'll be shocked. I don't think the problem with this organization is necessarily cheap or stingy, it's that they have terrible baseball people who have no business in the baseball business. You see JP Ricciardi get fired and then you see the Mets might be interested in hiring him. It seems like the Wilpons are on some anti-sabermetrics quest. -X-
Awesome. Exactly - that's it. I remember thinking back when Doubleday lost control to the Wilpons, "uh oh, I think the wrong partner took control of this team" Boy was I ever right about that. Did you see the spectacular awesome new Target Field in Minnesota? Citi looks like a dump compared to it. They have not one, but two giant Twins logos displayed behind the OF - the current one, and the great "handshake" logo from the 60's. It does something when they homer - as does the Phillie's Liberty bell at Citizens park. All we have is ugly banners and two scoreboards hidden by more ads. Most of these other parks also have out of town scores displayed along the fence. Ours is small, and near the planes going by. Those guys are idiots plain and simple. Jerry? Not his fault and a new manager won't matter. Our problem is some bad contracts (Castillo, Ollie) and the injury fiascos. (You know them all) No way Jacobs and Tatis should be in a starting lineup here. Meanwhile, Wagner helps Atlanta win.
I miss the gold ol' days when we had the starting pitchers only to see our bullpen implode. At least the games were over when they were over. Now? Over before they take the field.
they aren't cheap or stingy with player, they just have an idiot who doesn't know how to spend. signing a big contract every off season is a waste if you just surround those players with players not good enough to start on any other team.
I really don't get it. I think they probably either have an antiquated scouting department or a scouting department full of "old school" types. There is some overarching out of whack organizational philosophy that says "if they're not good enough for the Kansas City Royals, they're good enough to start for us!" -X-
Bobby V The Mets must fire Manual and bring back Bobby V .Manual is a joke .He can't manage .They also have to get rid of Minaya and them start getting rid of "deadwood" players .
well with freddy skillsets now retired as owner and having his dodger stadium built already; and Jeffy boy now in charge and having his yes man ricco waiting in wings we as fans got to hope and pray someone wipes out the wilpon clan . ownerships unwilling ness to stay out of baseball issues and its unwillingness to overslot for ifa and draft just kill the org. no self respecting baseball man will come over to mets org and be a wilpon yes man or puppet. only time this team will win is if it can wilpon proof the season. only as co-owner have the wilpons ever been to world series as full owners since 2002 they been failures
