Fred Wilpon: "I screwed up"

Uh, yeah. But he doesn't actually apologize for firing Willie at 3:18 am after the first game of a west coast trip (a win). He just "said he should have anticipated how the timing would go over with the media." What a schmuck. I didn't even like Willie Randolph, but having an owner and "CEO" this inept can't be good for the franchise.

In the notes section of that Courant piece is a rumor that the Mets have asked the Rockies about Brian Fuentes and the asking price is Jon Niese. Omar is apparently balking but as I've said before I don't consider Niese a real blue chip prospect, and after watching Tuesday night's debacle a consistent, high K:BB reliever would really hit the spot. If he's going to gear up for a playoff run, I think it makes sense. Of course I'm not sure how good a bet the Mets are to make the playoffs, but they are tied for the division lead!

Maybe the biggest benefit of the Willie Randolph firing

I had forgotten that Willie Randolph had prohibited the Mets from growing facial hair, stealing a rule that's both a registered trademark of the Steinbrenner Yankees and stupid on the merits.

Sure, Yankees and wannabe Yankees could grow mustaches like Jason Giambi's current gem, but why say no to the possibility of cool below-the-lip facial hair, like that sported by Billy Koch, Scott Spezio, or late career Jeff Bagwell?

It's good Jerry Manuel doesn't want to live in that kind of drab, soulless world.

Night of the Long Knives

Well, it's over. The Mets are kind of a dysfunctional organization, as it turns out. They called Willie in for that meeting which they said publicly was largely because of his "they're after me because I'm black" comments. (His most hilarious evidence: Everyone wants Isaiah Thomas fired, too!). They apparently wanted to assure the "white working class" segment of the fanbase that such insolence would not be tolerated, but they also said Willie was staying, even though that was obviously not going to be true if they kept losing on even a semi-regular basis. The headline I saw this morning was "Mets Handle Randolph Firing Like a Bunch of Cowards", which seems right.

Anyway I'm happy about it because I really don't care who the manager is, just as long as I don't have to hear a lot of manager controversy, and I think Willie was kind of a buffoon and not a great tactician.