Willie: The Gary Carter Shark is Circling

[batmagadanleadoff]

Carter would love to take Shea reins as Mets manager

BY ADAM RUBIN
DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER

Friday, May 23rd 2008, 10:23 PM


DENVER - Gary Carter, who is managing the independent Orange County Flyers, is again talking his way out of a job - a job that still belongs to Willie Randolph.

Asked about his interest in managing the Mets on "The Mike and Murray Show" on Sirius Satellite Radio, Carter said: "Boy, I'll tell you what. I would love that, guys. When I saw that on ESPN today ... I got on the phone and I called (Mets VP of media relations) Jay Horwitz and I asked Jay, 'Should I try to call Mr. Wilpon?' If there is this going on I just want them to know of my availability. I'm only a phone call away, because my contract allows me to leave the ballclub. I could be in New York tomorrow, if necessary, because if there's anything at the major league level I can leave this job." Carter added: "The comments that David Wright made saying that, you know, there's no spark, there's no fire - if anything I would love to bring that to the table because you know me, guys, I love the game, have a great passion for it and you know my enthusiasm."

Carter had openly campaigned for Art Howe's job as well while Howe was still at the Mets' helm.

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]Carter had openly campaigned for Art Howe's job as well while Howe was still at the Mets' helm.

Carter also campaigned for Keith's team captainship throughout all of the 1987 season. He campaigned by whining and sulking, and then by openly denying that he was ever interested in the thing whenever Davey Johnson would ask him directly. In the end, Carter was able to manipulate the situation to his favor by getting Johnson to finally give the big spoiled baby the captainship that he so jealously coveted (co-captainship, really) a year later without ever having to specifically ask for it.

[batmagadanleadoff]

] Carter had openly campaigned for Art Howe's job as well while Howe was still at the Mets' helm.

Carter also campaigned unsuccessfully for the 1986 NL MVP award and continued to do so even after it was awarded to Mike Schmidt, and even though Carter wasn't even the second best player on his own team that year.

[batmagadanleadoff]

The New York Times also reported this story.
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Carter Has Eye on Randolph�s Job

On �The Mike & Murray Show� on Sirius Satellite Radio, the former Met Gary Carter campaigned to replace Randolph. Carter, a Hall of Famer, is the manager of the Orange County Flyers of the independent Golden Baseball League.

According to a transcript of the program, Carter said that when he heard of Randolph�s troubles, he �immediately� called Jay Horwitz, the Mets� vice president for media relations, and asked if he should call the team�s principal owner, Fred Wilpon. �I just want them to know of my availability.� Carter said. �I�m only a phone call away. I could be in New York tomorrow.�

Carter referred to comments by David Wright about the team�s lacking spark. �You know my enthusiasm, and hopefully I would be able to bring that to maybe help turn that ball club around,� he said.

�There�s way too much talent there for them to be a game under .500 and to lose four in a row to the Braves. I think that they�ve just become complacent in some ways ever since their demise of last year. And if you look at Willie�s record, it is right around .500 since June of last year. And when you have that much talent, there are a lot more expectations than where they�re at right now.� (NYT)

[G-Fafif]

Did he also mention, "We all remember George Bamberger was replaced in June in California"?

[Benjamin Grimm]

I really wish he'd go away.

If he gets the Mets manager's job, I'm going to move out of the country.

[Frayed Knot]

"When I saw that on ESPN today ... I got on the phone and I called Jay Horwitz and I asked Jay, 'Should I try to call Mr. Wilpon?' If there is this going on I just want them to know of my availability. I'm only a phone call away, because my contract allows me to leave the ballclub. I could be in New York tomorrow ... "

Wow!
Just wow.

[metirish]

That's real scumbag type stuff from Carter.

[Frayed Knot]

I suppose one could make the argument that if it's going to happen anyway he's just making sure his name is in the hopper for potential replacements ... but it does give the appearence of jumping on his grave before it's even completely dug.

[batmagadanleadoff]

This just in: Gary Carter said that if he was given the Mets managerial position, he'll never play the race card.

[Guest AG/DC]

Really, is there anything unusual about this Gary Carter move?

Among his other open campaigns was his campaign for the Hall of Fame, to the point where he actually scheduled a party to celebrate his election one year only to have to cancel it.

One paragraph that got cut due to space concerns.

I told Jay that my cell phone number is 714-821-9063 and that I can be reached by e-mail at

8kid8@thegamer.com

--- that's

8kid8@thegamer.com

. I can be reached at any time, and I've already booked a flight to Colorado just in case. I'm working on lineup cards right now! Praise God!

I really think Willie is done. But this sort of thing so makes me root for him.

[Guest themetfairy]

I loved Carter as a player, but I truly don't think he's the right person to manage this team. This kind of maneuvering is desperate, and I don't think he has enough managerial experience to make this team productive.

[Guest Rockin' Doc]

A completely clueless, self promotional lack of class by Carter.

Thankfully, I see little chance that his campaigning for the job will make any difference. I believe that he has virtually no shot at replacing Willie when that time inevitabkly comes.

[Guest AG/DC]

I loved Gary Carter as a player also. His unselfawareness made him the comic relief in my favorite action show.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Rockin' Doc wrote: Thankfully, I see little chance that his campaigning for the job will make any difference.

If nothing else, yesterday's story indicates that Carter hasn't been contacted by the Mets.

[G-Fafif]

Heard Kid on the FAN with Steve Somers in the 2 o'clock hour. No, of course I'm not campaigning for Willie's job, he said, while continuing to campaign for it.

He regrets if referencing that moment of trauma for our entire nation, and particularly for the Bamberger family was in any way offensive.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

biographer hopes WWSB will still be around when his book comes out...

]The Willie Randolph I know well BY Wayne coffey DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER Saturday, May 24th 2008, 8:01 PM Men's Health magazine First, a disclosure: I am not unbiased on the subject of Willie Randolph. I am, in fact, quite biased. I am working with him on his autobiography, and have been for more than a year. I have spent time with him at home and on the road, walked through his old Brooklyn housing project with him, been inside the sharecropper's shack he was born in in Holly Hill, South Carolina. I've seen him in proud paternal afterglow, after giving the commencement address at Fordham for his daughter's graduation last spring, and seen him at the other end of the emotional spectrum, in teary-eyed despondence after the Mets' collapse last fall. Through it all, I think I've gained much insight into the man behind the stoic mask you see in the Mets' dugout, and can offer this without qualification: Willie Randolph is not just a good man. He is an exemplary man. He is a man of strength, dignity, character and steadfastness. After a horrible week in which his team took another maddening downturn and he said things he should not have said about race and supposed network plots, and the usual media bottom-feeders began calling for his head, I think it is a point worth noting. It is also worth noting that this is a person of profound toughness and resiliency. Has there ever been a major-league manager who went on more job interviews - at least a dozen over a dozen years - and never allowed himself to give up? Underestimate him at your own peril. Willie Randolph, after all, didn't merely find a way out of the projects. He found it with a moral compass learned from a loving and unyielding mother, and a work ethic learned from a father who worked construction all day and drove a gypsy cab at night - even while his son was a world champion and All-Star playing for the Yankees. You can fairly question (and many have) any number of Randolph's in-game decisions. You can say that he has shown excessive faith in Aaron Heilman, much as he did last year with Guillermo Mota. You can point to the inarguable truth that the Mets have been a .500 team for a calendar year now and the manager has not been able to find a way to shake them from their win-a-few, lose-a-few doldrums. But does that mean these Mets will never lock into a winning mindset, won't ever learn how to grind out victories, won't ever locate and sustain the inner resolve that is their manager's trademark? Maybe it does. But maybe it doesn't, and if there's any man well-equipped to battle and keep battling, to reach the players (and let's be honest - there are a few of them who are such one-gear guys as to make Kevin McReynolds look grittier than Pete Rose), it's Randolph. Eight months ago, Tom Coughlin was a sideline lunatic and out-of-touch control freak who needed to go off and play shuffleboard. How's the lunatic looking now? The point is that perceptions change, teams change, players - and who knows how or why this happens? - find character and grit they didn't know they had. Four seasons ago, Willie Randolph did the hardest thing there is to do in sports: he came in and helped shed a team of its losing culture. I've seen Willie Randolph bestow all sorts of small kindnesses on people, when nobody was looking. I've seen him privately console a battered reliever who took the ball to help the team and got booed off the mound. I've seen how he treats hotel housekeepers and parking lot attendants. I've seen how, in the midst of last September's ugliness, he invited an ailing, old friend named Joe Goldberg into the dugout before the game, saw how he hugged him and told him that he loved him. This doesn't make him the manager of the year, and certainly isn't going to change the tenor of WFAN calls if the Mets don't start winning. But it speaks to the essence of the man - a man worth rooting for, and a man the Mets are fortunate to have.

[MFS62]

IMO the only reason Carter wants to manage a major league team in New York is bacause there will be cameras from at least five tv stations at the daily post game news conferences.

Later

[Frayed Knot]

Keith just called Carter "unconscious"

Def #1: without awareness, sensation, or cognition

[batmagadanleadoff]

="G-Fafif"]Heard Kid on the FAN with Steve Somers in the 2 o'clock hour. No, of course I'm not campaigning for Willie's job, he said, while continuing to campaign for it.

I read about Carter clarifying his initial comments on your web-site. Carter's explanation doesn't jibe; he could have spoken to Jay Horwitz in private to throw his (big) hat into the ring without disrespecting Randolph publicly. Carter's actions were not mutually exclusive.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Frayed Knot wrote: Keith just called Carter "unconscious" Def #1: without awareness, sensation, or cognition

"Unconscionable" is also acceptable.

[batmagadanleadoff]

="Frayed Knot"]Keith just called Carter "unconscious" Def #1: without awareness, sensation, or cognition

Here's Keith's exact quote:

"Keith Hernandez ripped his former New York Mets teammate, Gary Carter, during Saturday's game on New York's WPIX-TV, calling him 'unconscious' in the wake of Carter openly campaigning for the Mets' managerial job currently occupied by Willie Randolph.

'... I've kept quiet for such a long time, but for the people out there listening, just go in the dictionary and look up unconscious and you'll find a picture of Gary Carter,' Hernandez said. "I know that's strong, but it just happens too many times and it's just, you're walking around unconscious."

Carter said in a radio interview Friday that he had reached out to the Mets when he learned Randolph's job might be in jeopardy.

[batmagadanleadoff]

]Keith Hernandez said: "... I've kept quiet for such a long time, but for the people out there listening, just go in the dictionary and look up unconscious and you'll find a picture of Gary Carter"

Keith's "for such a long time" phrasing interests me. Who knows what deep-rooted animosities exist between Keith and Gary? Carter's narcissistic pursuit of the team captainship that was originally given to Hernandez only always bothered me. If Davey Johnson originally intended for Keith and only Keith to be the Mets captain, then that should've been a part of Keith's legacy. And it was selfish of Carter to manipulate Johnson otherwise. Carter essentially diminished the great honor bestowed upon Keith in order to tame his own jealousies.

I can still remember Hernandez being interviewed right after Keith's team captainship was diluted into two co-captainships in order to placate the spoiled Carter. When asked how he felt about it, Hernandez politely said that it was Davey's decision all the way and if that's how Davey wanted it to be, then Keith was fine with it. I could swear that Keith was rolling his eyes during the whole interview.

Carter's no Kid. He's a baby. A spoiled baby. I hope that the next Mets manager is assigned uniform #8. Or the next call-up.

[Frayed Knot]

My recollection of the whole captaincy stuff is that Hernandez never wanted it to begin with - or at least never cared one way or the other - thinking that trying to designate who should lead and/or follow with a meaningless title was pretty much a waste of time.
'Uhhh yeah ... this is, ummm, quite an honor ... I guess.'

That he objected to Carter's subsequent whining was probably more annoyance at Gary's penchant for butting in when he wasn't getting all the ink than it was about having to share his newly minted 'C'.

The "unconcious" line sounds like it was aimed at Carter's "unawareness, sensation, or cognition" at how what he does affects anyone other than Gary Carter. Keith preceded that comment with one about how he had tremendous respect for Carter the balplayer, but ...

[batmagadanleadoff]

Frayed Knot wrote: That he objected to Carter's subsequent whining was probably more annoyance at Gary's penchant for butting in when he wasn't getting all the ink than it was about having to share his newly minted 'C'.

I agree. As far as I remember, Keith never openly complained about having to share his captaincy with Carter, and was always diplomatic about the situation whenever asked.

[Guest AG/DC]

Yeah, those elipses before the quote were telling.

[stevejrogers]

IIRC it was always assumed that Hernandez was always the "unofficial" captain without the title as he brought his 1982 ring with him, was the unquestioned field general of the infield and the guy always talking to the pitcher.

In Jeff Pearlman's book Keith describes an incident in the summer of 1986 where he actually identifies himself as the Met "captain" so even if he wasn't the official captain, or even the MLBPA rep (I believe it was Ray Knight at the time) for the Mets at the time he did consider himself a leader of the Met clubhouse.

Not sure why it was made "official," perhaps the Mets were concerned with some off the field issues with Hernandez, or just plain thought he needed to be more of a leader than he actually was?

Was he named after the infamous photo day fight with Strawberry in 1987?

[Farmer Ted]

Buster Olney on Mike & Mike today eluding to Keith possibly being the next Mets manager if Willie takes the axe. Wow.

[Guest AG/DC]

Keith absent from the booth tonight?

Would he still get those in-season vacations to maintain residency in Florida?

[Guest themetfairy]

AG/DC wrote: Keith absent from the booth tonight? Would he still get those in-season vacations to maintain residency in Florida?

That's my assumption.