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Willie Plays The Race Card

Willie Randolph makes $2 million, and he will make $2,250,000 in 2009 whether he is or isn't still managing the Mets.

Randolph's team has underachieved this season and last. Yet he wonders about the criticism toward him. "Is it racial? Huh? It smells a little bit," he charged.

If the Mets continue to underachieve, Willie will be fired, just like the Mets fired Davey Johnson and Bobby Valentine - both of whom took the Mets farther than Randolph has - and both of whom are of course white.

Indeed, the Mets have fired every manager they have ever hired with the exceptions of Casey Stengel - who retired during the 1965 season after breaking his hip at age 75 - and Gil Hodges, who died suddenly just prior to the start of the 1972 season. Hodges' replacement, Yogi Berra, was fired during the 1975 season, despite taking the Mets to Game 7 of the 1973 World Series.

Managers and coaches in professional sports are fired all the time, and Randolph should know that as well as anyone.

Randolph argues that he took the Mets to Game 7 of the LCS. Well, Grady Little did the same thing for the Red Sox and never managed another game for Boston after Pedro Martinez blew the lead and Aaron Boone's homer won the pennant for the Yankees. (Boone, who never played another game for the Yankees, is also indicative of how expendable everyone involved in pro sports is.)

I do not like Willie Randolph as Mets manager. I don't like his stubborn refusal to give young players like Ruben Gotay, Heath Bell and Jeff Keppinger a chance. I don't like his failure to hold veterans accountable for their mistakes, and I don't like the large doghouse he places young players in when they make a mistake. I think he uses too many relievers for short stints. I think his baseball IQ is nowhere near that of Johnson and Valentine. That he has done a better job than Art Howe did, as he argues in his own defense, hardly impresses me.

There are, still, very serious issues regarding race in this country. There is real employment discrimination - not the sort involving a baseball manager. There are many blacks in prison for crimes they did not commit. There are the slights, curses and insults directed at racial and religious minorities that never make the news, but occur in daily life.

While some of his detractors surely are racist, overwhelmingly, the criticism toward Randolph is not race-based. Randolph's insinuation to the contrary is a shame.
posted on 5/20/2008