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In a move widely anticipated, the Mets fired Willie Randolph this morning. They basically had fired him about a month ago, but they didn’t do the actual firing, making the Mets a lame duck team with a lame duck manager. I have never been a fan of firing a coach at this point in the season. I think if you are going to fire a manager you do it earlier in the season (which the Mets essentially did except for the actual firing part) or you do it in the offseason. Willie probably should have been fired after last season. After that collapse the team needed a fresh start.

The Mets may rebound and start playing better (I certainly hope not as a Phillies fan) and everyone will attribute that to a new manager, but I have hard time believing that it would be because of the manager. The Phillies underachieved for much of last year and then started to play better in the second half and they didn’t change managers. Teams generally find a way to play at their talent level (the Tigers and Yankees being pretty good examples as they slowly start to play better: 8-2 and 7-3 in their last ten respectively) and changing the manager 10 games before the midway point has little to do with getting them to play that way.

As for the Phillies, they played a very complete game last night against the Red Sox and continue to lead the division. They have a tough next few weeks (with series against the Red Sox, Angels, Braves and Mets all within the next three weeks) and they are going to need to keep winning games to stay in the lead. The Marlins, Braves and Mets don’t really seem to be going anywhere so the Phillies could be in for a long divisional battle. If the offense can keep rolling with the top 5 (Rollins, Victorino, Utley, Howard, Burrell) continuing to lead the way and the role players continuing to make big impacts and the pitching can remain consistent, the Phillies can really make some noise this season. They have shown a knack for playing from behind and, with Brad Lidge anchoring a surprising bullpen, they can certainly play with a lead. The Phillies are maddeningly inconsistent at times, but they really can play with anyone as long as their pitching can keep them in ballgames. Here’s hoping they keep playing that way.

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