|
[url=http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/article.jsp?ymd=20061023&content_id=1721893&vkey=news_nym&fext=.jsp&c_id=nym]Randolph Reflects on what-ifs of NLCS[/url]
Mets manager doesn't second-guess himself for decisions
]NEW YORK -- Days away from the ballpark already had helped purge some of the unwanted images. Time worked like a child's Magic Slate for Willie Randolph. The two plastic sheets peeled away from the black grease board, and the image of Yadier Molina's home run vanished just like that. It's gone now, at least until the next highlight package shows it again.
A football Sunday and visits from his brothers and their families had served the same purpose. Distraction is a wonderful thing.
The Randolph support group can do just so much, though. Sometimes misery prefers the company of other misery. And the Tigers' fourth inning in Game 2 of the World Series on Sunday night provided that.
"What makes me feel better is seeing a team with the bases loaded and not scoring any runs," the Mets manager said Monday. "Like [Sunday] night. That makes me feel better. Because it's like 'Wow. We had our shot, man.' So I don't feel too bad. They're in the World Series. 'Look at that. Bases loaded, nobody out and they got nothing out of it.' That's therapy for me."
And for now, that therapy may work for Randolph, his players, employers and all those who felt the pain of Thursday night. The wound is closing, healing has begun. But television or not, there will be replays, or at least reminders.
For Jim Leyland, then the Pirates manager, there was a failed, last-second pass in some football game in 1992, weeks after Francisco Cabrera's hit had ushered Leyland's team out the postseason door. The incompletion picked at the scab that formed over Cabrera's hit.
Years after Davey Johnson had endured the Mets' shortfall in the 1988 NLCS, he was the Dodgers manager, and John Shelby was a regular visitor in Johnson's Spring Training office; so was the walk to Shelby that preceded Mike Scioscia's Mets-devastating home run in Game 4 in 1988. "He never brings it up," Johnson said. "He doesn't have to."
What will it be for Randolph? Steve Trachsel's collapse in Game 3, Scott Spiezio's triple in Game 2, Chris Duncan's home run in Game 5? Or the ninth-inning home run in Game 7 that changed Molina's middle name to one he now shares with Bucky Dent and Aaron Boone?
Randolph was in his Shea Stadium office Monday, dealing with loose ends four days after a tight seventh game in a tighter NLCS. "I feel really good today," he said.
He's been through it enough to know the feelings will fade -- and to know the hurt will occasionally make a comeback. But for now, he's dealing with it.
"Initially, you're kind of -- I wouldn't say shocked because I've been through this many, many times. You're hurt," he said. "You're disappointed for your players. That was my first thing, when I got back [in the clubhouse] ... to make sure that they were okay. I've been through a lot of this, most recently the Boston Red Sox thing [in 2004]. But this is my team. It stings more.
"It's a different kind of feeling you get when you get so close. The next day I was a little bummed out, I guess. But just thinking about where we've come from and what we've accomplished, you kind of get back into a different sense after a while. You're with your family, people come over, everyone's having fun. You get back to some normalcy. I'm fine. It wasn't like I was ready to cut my wrists or anything like that.
"It was disappointing, not disappointing that we didn't do this, but disappointing that we didn't get to the next level. When you get to the World Series, you're a part of history. Whether you win or lose, you're part of something very special. When someone says 'The 2006 World Series,' your name is going to be attached to that. And I just wanted my kids to be affiliated with that because of what we've done as a team, how far we've come in such a short period of time.
"We were just so close and that's what probably hurt me more than anything, that we didn't get the chance to experience that together."
Randolph, dressed in denim and wearing a baseball cap, sat at the right angle formed by his desk and spoke of what had gone right and wrong. His words weren't a stream of consciousness only. He responded to specific questions from reporters, occasionally providing glimpses of what he saw from the dugout in seven games.
"The Cardinals kind of played the way we play when we play well," he said. "How many pitches did they foul back? How many bloop hits? They stayed on pitches. They did it with little bites, like we preach here. We did at times, but not all the time. I thought we got a little big at times."
Cliff Floyd pinch-hit with none out in the ninth inning of Game 7 and runners on first and second base and the Cardinals leading by two runs. He got a little big, Randolph acknowledged.
"Relax, get a good pitch to hit, put a good swing on it," the manager remembered telling Floyd. "Just tried to give him a little confidence. Don't try to be a hero here. I'm not looking for you to hit a three-run homer. Relax, get a good pitch to hit and drive the ball."
Floyd tried to hit the first pitch from Adam Wainwright all the way to the Detroit.
"Sometimes you get caught up in the moment. I wasn't thinking home run there. I was just thinking that he'd hit the ball in the gap somewhere and [Endy Chavez] could score from first [to tie the score]."
But why had Randolph used Floyd rather than have another player bunt?
"We had bases loaded for Carlos Beltran. Same scenario, right?" he said. "Just make believe I bunted. It would have been the same thing, right?
"I don't second-guess all that stuff, man. If you subscribe to that, then we would have had the same situation. If you believe we would have bunted and Jose Reyes would have hit that ball to center field. If you look at it that way and that's the way most people look at it. It would have been two outs, [Paul] Lo Duca would have walked. Same scenario is set up.
"That's the way I look at it because no one knows. I don't believe in that situation in giving up an out. One run down? A tie game? Yeah, I probably do [bunt] then. But not with two runs down and you've got momentum going. I didn't send Cliff to hit a three-run homer. I was hoping he'd drive the ball into the gap. He's an excellent doubles hitter, one of the few guys on my team who doesn't hit into double plays. He's a fly ball guy. I'm not thinking he's going to hit a grandiose home run. He's going to drive the ball. We're going to keep the momentum going. We're going to score a couple of runs.
"You can look back -- and I don't -- and think about what you could have done, should have done. But the bottom line is that thing played out the way we wanted it to. And maybe even better because we had our best hitter, a Cardinal killer, at the plate; with one hit we're going to the World Series.
"Wouldn't change a thing. Second-guess whether I would have bunted or not. Who knows? I might have put Anderson Hernandez up there and in front of 50,000 people, the 20-year-old kid could have [not gotten it done]. He might have popped that ball off ... or tried to bunt against a guy with a hellacious curveball and a 95 mph fastball and gotten to a point where he had to swing with two strikes on him and he hit into a double play or whatever. ... Say Glavine gets a bunt down. There's no guarantee. It's not always easy to lay a bunt down, especially when all the money's on the table like that. ... I thought about it. I thought about it way before it came up. But I still felt like with two runs to come across I needed to keep our momentum going.
"It would have been [an] easy call for [a] bunt. Outside of that, I didn't want to give up an out in that situation. In hindsight, it turned out even better, perfectly, for us. Best hitter. This guy killed the Cardinals all series. He threw a nasty curveball and Beltran got locked up. I'd like him to have taken a swing there. But the guy has a great curveball. He made a great pitch. I know that's part of it, people want to second guess that. But I feel real good about the decisions I made."
Randolph discussed other topics:
• His hopes that potential free agents Tom Glavine and Orlando Hernandez return: "I'm not into the business end of what's going on with Glavine. I would hope that we would sign Glavine back. I think that he's very important to our club. He had a nice year for me, he's one of the real leaders on my club, and I don't know what's going on there. I just want to put my little vote in, sitting down with him and seeing if they could iron out whatever options they got or whatever is going on with him.
"I think he's very important as far as the leadership of our staff, especially if you're not going to have someone like a Pedro [Martinez] until later on with some of the young players who might step in and maybe take over a spot in the rotation.
"Listen, this guy [Hernandez] is an unbelievable athlete. You're always concerned about injuries, and he had that injury at the end of this season. But Duque can pitch for me any day. If you just look at the way he takes care of himself. He's a pure competitor. I would love to have him back. I've always been one of his biggest fans, I just don't know where he fits as far as what the upstairs plans are.
"If you ask me if I want him back, yes, definitely. For what he did this year, and the way he came on, there's no doubt in my mind if we went on he would have taken the ball the first game or two because he would have been ready. He's a warrior. I've used that many times with El Duque, but yeah, he would fit in nicely with anybody.
• His feelings about Floyd and Jose Valentin returning: "Guys who have played hard for me, guys who have gone to bat for me, I always want back because they've shown me what they're all about."
• And the likelihood of a contract extension for him:
"I haven't brought it up. Guys mention it off and on, but they haven't approached me on it. Hopefully they'll sit down, Omar [Minaya, the general manager] and Jeff [Wilpon, the COO], and feel that's something they might want to do. But I really haven't talked to anyone about that at all." It would be, as he said "a nice reward," but as he also said, "It's not rewarding until it happens," and he laughed. "I have another year on my contract, so they're under no obligation obviously to do anything. I feel like I've done a nice job since I've been here. I would love to be the leader of this ballclub for a long time, whatever that means. I'm just excited about the progress we've made moving forward.
"Obviously when I came here last year, I had an idea, a philosophy that I tried to implement how I wanted the team to play, and we've come together a lot sooner than I thought we would, so that's exciting for me. When you start something, you want to be able to finish it in some way, and I still feel like we could be better. I would love to be a part of it. But I'm just a part of it.
"The way I look at it, I'm the keeper, I'm here to give it up to these kids, so obviously, if I have one year left, it would be nice to be able to go further and extend that whole vision. And it's going to take more than a year, I think, before we get to where we want to go. I'd like to be at the helm of that. I came here with an idea to get the job done, to win, until I do that I don't feel comfortable talking about and getting into contract stuff because that's out of my hands."
Marty Noble is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs. |
|
