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Wilpons are worst owners in town

Wallace Matthews

12:21 PM EDT, June 17, 2008

In the end, the Wilpons treated Willie Randolph like he was one of the junkyard dealers across the street from CitiField, an eyesore and an annoyance to be cleared out as quickly and quietly as possible.

And in the grand tradition of bullies and cowards throughout history, they dispatched Omar Minaya like some corporate Luca Brasi to do their dirty work, to fly across the country and ice the manager in the middle of the night.

And after the deed is done, Fred Wilpon, officially-licensed Nice Guy, goes on the radio to profess that his hands are free of blood. "Omar is in charge," he says. "It was his decision. You have to ask Omar about that."

Jeff Wilpon, as is his penchant, remains silent and inaccessible, untouchable and unaccountable, a pseudo tough guy willing to pass the sentence but not execute it, or even own up to it.

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Fred Wilpon, it turns out, is as spineless as his son is soulless. With all his money, he never bothered to buy his kid a clue or, it turns out, one for himself. If he truly believes any of you are going to buy the line that Minaya did this on his own, he has less respect for the intelligence of his fan base than even I could have thought possible.

But then, why should they have any more regard for the people buying their tickets and their cheap merchandise than they did for the man managing their team?

All along, The Wilpons have tried to play everyone for suckers, but it turns out they are the biggest suckers of all.

As a result, The Wilpons today assume sole possession of the title, "Worst Sports Owners in Town," which is quite an accomplishment considering this town also boasts Charles Wang, Woody Johnson, the long-running reality show known as "The Steinbrenners," and everyone's favorites, Dolan & Son.

But not even James Dolan, the poster child for bad ownership, would have handled this as badly as the Mets, or more correctly, The Wilpons, did. From a personal standpoint, his worst crime was making Don Chaney drive to Westchester to run a Knicks' practice session before wielding the axe. That hardly compares with schlepping a manager and two doomed coaches across the country on a red-eye flight following a doubleheader, only to send them all back again, jobless, less than a day later.

And from his history, we know Dolan never would have allowed the media to force his hand or make his decision. We know from the Anucha Browne Sanders case that bad publicity doesn't frighten him, nor does bad performance necessarily bother him. If Willie had been working for Dolan, he probably would have gotten a contract extension. And when it came time to fire him, he would have done it, even if it was Christmas morning.

But clearly, The Wilpons -- they are now a tandem act, no more separating "Nice Fred" from "Nasty Jeff" -- didn't want to take the hit for firing their manager, a father of four, on Father's Day, nor did they want to lead Tuesday's paper with the news of their treachery.

So they tried to do it while the lights were out, when they thought no one would notice.

Understand that there is no quibble here with firing the manager. Fair or not, when a team stinks it up as bad as the Mets have, the manager is always the first to go. But there is a right way and wrong way to do things, and if The Wilpons have demonstrated any discernible talent around here, it is their unerring knack for doing things the wrong way.

This is an organization with a long history of that, from the publc humiliation of Cleon Jones to the trading away of Tom Seaver to their planned banishment of long-time ticket holders in favor of the corporate fan base they are shamelessly courting to fill the obscenely-priced seats at CitField, this franchise has had more than its share of cringe-inducing moments.

You thought you had seen the worst of all last September, when they gagged away a 7-game lead in a stupefying 17 days.

But what The Wilpons did to Willie Randolph tops even that.

The Worst Sports Owners in Town just provided you with the most embarrassing moment in New York Mets history.