Tony Bernazard---The Epitome Of Evil Among Baseball Executives

• Tony Bernazard, Tony Bernazard, Tony Bernazard and, lest we forget, Tony Bernazard:

I hadn't realized that Tony Bernazard was such a powerful and evil force among the Mets hierarchy that he's the behind the scenes puppetmaster who's orchestrated every move the

Mets have made over the past four years and that he and he alone is the mastermind behind Willie Randolph's demise.
I have no way of knowing what's true and what isn't in regards to Bernazard, but it does seem that he's becoming the fall guy for whatever went wrong between Randolph and the Mets; that being said, for all those that have been relentlessly ripping the Mets for the way

they fired Randolph, it's in the same ballpark when these anonymous quotes are popping up from people whispering in the ears of dubious messengers saying that Bernazard is a "bad" guy. When there are guys like Chris "The Biggest Idiot In The World" Russo going off on tangents saying that the Mets should "get Bernazard outta here" without knowing exactly what Bernazard did or didn't do, it's more of a search for a fall guy in the Randolph firing other than Randolph himself.
You can say whatever you want about Mets GM Omar Minaya and owners Fred and Jeff Wilpon, but one thing you cannot say is that they're stupid. Minaya may be taking advice from Bernazard, but if Bernazard had so much power in the organization and hated Randolph that much, then Randolph might have been gone after the 2006 NLCS. Now we hear that because of Bernazard's former top tier position with the players union, the Mets would never

bring in a player who'd crossed the picket line thirteen years ago, which leaves Kevin Millar (pretty much exactly the type of player the Mets could use) as a non-option. I would hope that Minaya isn't so easily manipulated that he's going to let such a forgotten thing as that to prevent him from bringing in a player the Mets need. It was so long ago and just about every team has forgiven and forgotten the players who crossed the line that it's absurd to think that a guy like Millar would be excluded out of hand based on the say-so of the assistant GM.
It's easy to play the game of telephone and repeat rumors about Bernazard's supposed

power in the organization, but Minaya isn't going to let his assistant tell him what to do when it's his job and reputation on the line. The easiest thing in the world for a reporter to do is to say, "I heard " from an anonymous source and not be required to back it up with facts because they have their own agendas like a latter day Deep Throat without benefit of verifiable truths.
This reminds me of when the New York Giants had hired a new veteran defensive coach named Rod Rust and Rust used a system called "read and react" which some reporters decided they didn't like. All of a sudden there were numerous phone calls to sports talk radio ripping the "read and react" system which the vast majority of them couldn't distinguish from any other system that defensive coaches use; but Rust became the villain in the Giants fall and was eventually replaced.
Rumors are rumors and word of mouth is word of mouth, but there doesn't seem to be any concrete facts with Bernazard either having the power to do what he's said to have done or that he and he alone is responsible for Willie Randolph's failures. Randolph was notoriously thin-skinned as a player, coach and manager and it may be that he was overly sensitive to a perceived interloper in his clubhouse and if that's the case, he should have taken a stronger stand against Bernazard hanging around and making him feel uncomfortable. Even if Bernazard did everything he's alleged to have done, it's partly Randolph's fault for not taking care of it so it wouldn't be an issue.

• J.P. Ricciardi----the gift that keeps on giving:

J.P Ricciardi apologized for his radio show roasting of Reds outfielder Adam Dunn----ESPN Story----but this appears to be a longstanding modus operandi of Ricciardi. He rips a player reacting in uncontrolled and unfiltered anger, contritely apologizes and goes back to business until he does it again. Buster Olney said on Baseball Tonight that Ricciardi

called Reds GM Walt Jocketty, apologized, and was trying to get in touch with Dunn to do the same.
Whether Dunn accepts that apology is up to him, but another interesting thing that Olney brought up is that there's a similar feeling around the Blue Jays as there was around the Mets in Willie Randolph's last days and that Blue Jays manager John Gibbons is close to being fired. Just so I understand, Ricciardi, whose term as Blue Jays GM has been mediocre at best, is going to be allowed to fire his third manager during his tenure? I have to openly wonder: How is Ricciardi still there? Does he have an unlimited amount of time to continually bring in another manager; then another manager; then another manager? Eduardo Perez (who is very good on the show by

the way) said that he thinks Cito Gaston will replace Gibbons if he's fired. Gaston has been unfairly deprived of another chance to manage after winning two World Series with the Blue Jays, but unless he's a miracle worker and gets the team to the playoffs, how likely is it that he's going to keep the job after the season if Ricciardi is finally let go?
The Blue Jays problems are not the fault of the manager. Gibbons is a fiery, solid X and O guy who should receive another chance to manage in a more stable situation. Does Ricciardi deserve another chance to change managers and deflect blame from himself? He's had almost seven years on the job and the team has never had more than 87 wins or been closer than nine games from a playoff spot at season's end. He's bluntly honest in his unguarded moments and extremely impressed with himself; perhaps Ricciardi would be better served to choose between his twin vocations of radio talk show host and GM and pick the one he's better at. It doesn't take a genius to figure out which of the two that is.

Conspiracy Theories And The Rapid Rash Of Firings

• Randolph's conspiracy theories (relayed through other parties):

The New York Post is implying, through quotations of anonymous Willie Randolph "friends" (take that for what it's worth) that the former Mets manager feels betrayed by new manager

Jerry Manuel and thinks that he may have been stabbed in the back by an ambitious subordinate----NY Post Story. If this is accurate, then Randolph is grasping at straws to find some reason why he was let go other than the reality of a team that was underperforming for him and hadn't played well and with life since early last season.
Any bench coach or "manager in waiting" is in a no-win situation while the entire episode is unfolding. Few and far between are the bench coaches who have little or no interest in becoming managers, so the current manager has to know that his trusted assistant would probably like nothing better than to have his job if the situation calls for it. Yesterday, I mentioned two recent situations where the bench coach may have undermined his manager to get the top spot; with Manuel, I didn't suspect similar machinations and I still don't. What was Manuel supposed to do? Was he supposed to ignore the front office personnel that wanted to talk to him because he didn't want to upset Randolph? Technically, since the front office personnel were above Randolph, they too were Manuel's bosses, so he had no choice but to respond to them when appropriate.
Randolph knew that there were front office personnel that wanted him out and had become paranoid (with good reason apparently), but to all of a sudden have "friends" implying that Randolph now feels betrayed by a bench coach with whom he'd become close and had counseled him during the turmoil strikes me as the Post either making things up or Randolph trying to find ways to deflect the blame away from himself for his dismissal.
It doesn't matter who the manager is and how close he is to a present of former employee

who's been mentioned as a possible successor, there has to be tension once the criticism becomes more pronounced, a firing is imminent and the replacement is seen to be skulking around and waiting for the job. Joe Torre was about as successful as a manager could be with the Yankees and had Joe Girardi as his bench coach before Girardi left to manage the Marlins, but Torre had to know when Girardi turned down several opportunities after the Marlins fired him and instead chose to work for the YES network, that his former catcher and coach had an eye on his job. Torre's bench coach from last season, Don Mattingly, doesn't have an undermining bone in his body, but Girardi seemed to be waiting for the opportunity that he eventually received. Friendship doesn't matter; loyalty doesn't matter and what actually happened doesn't matter; it's the perception that counts and if Randolph wants to see Manuel as a power hungry usurper who took his job through scheming, there's no way to dissuade him even if it's just a conspiracy theory to protect himself from the truth----he deserved to get fired.

• Mariners fire John McLaren:

This was somewhat inevitable once Bill Bavasi was fired even if it's just for cosmetic effect. McLaren may get another shot somewhere eventually (although he waited a really long time for this chance and may not have the stomach for another long delay), but it's hard to blame

him for this disaster. That being said, the Mariners have been unlucky and terrible in just about every phase of the game and that generally is a reflection on the manager.
Rob Neyer wonders if McLaren "could have fought harder for the young players he managed, particularly Adam Jones and Jeff Clement", but I don't think that McLaren would've been given such a strong voice in the construction of the team in his first full season on the job. Given Les Miserables Erik Bedard's injury-history and misanthropic behavior throughout his career, it was silly to think he was going to show up and suddenly become a legitimate number two starter and expected savior. The centerpiece of the deal for the Orioles, Adam Jones, hasn't been exactly lighting the world on fire in his chance to play, so it's hard to rip the deal as a total nightmare yet. With the fire both McLaren and Bavasi were under early in the season, they really couldn't afford to wait out Clement's struggles and try to win simultaneously.
McLaren may go down as a better coach than manager and, even though this wasn't exactly a fair chance for him, the results are what they are. The players didn't seem to be listening to him and installing Jim Riggleman makes sense to give the appearance of doing

something even if it's too late to do much of anything useful but clear out the house of some veterans and retool the organization.
One thing about Riggleman that needs to be watched is that he tends to batter his pitchers. While Dusty Baker has the Kerry Wood/injury problems laid at his feet, it was Riggleman who overused Wood as a rookie with some ridiculously high pitch counts----Wood 1998 Gamelogs. The argument that the Cubs were in a pennant race and were trying to win as many games as possible is the same argument that Baker can give for his usage of Wood and Mark Prior in 2003. The 1998 Cubs made the playoffs, but Wood missed the entire 1999 season with Tommy John surgery. Felix Hernandez is a valuable commodity who needs to be kept on a reasonable pitch count under Riggleman and if they're going to trade Bedard, they'd better keep him healthy and on the mound. They're out of the race, so going crazy with their pitchers makes no sense.

• J.P. Ricciardi's flapping mouth:

There are guys who should be baseball executives; there are guys who should have their

own radio shows; there are rarely guys who can effectively combine both. Say this for Blue Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi----he's entertaining. Now he's gotten into a war of words with Cincinnati Reds left fielder Adam Dunn. After receiving calls on his radio show from fans

advocating the Blue Jays acquisition of the power hitting left fielder, Ricciardi unloaded on the player----Story----with some unkind comments. As much as I hate to say it, Ricciardi might be well-suited to taking some lessons from Brian Cashman on saying a load of stuff while saying nothing at all. As annoying as it is, it seems to keep Cashman out of the same trouble that Ricciardi's free mouth uses to get himself into such verbal scrapes.
Never mind the inappropriate nature of a current GM unloading on a player in such a way, Ricciardi makes it worse by unloading on a player who isn't even on his team! It never ends in Toronto; Ricciardi's players fight with his manager (Ted Lilly and Shea Hillenbrand with John Gibbons); he accuses players of malingering and milking injuries (A.J. Burnett); he gets into

verbal confrontations with players and releases them in fits of anger knowing their penchant for getting off to slow starts and because they have contract options----that Ricciardi negotiated----which kick in with a certain number of at bats are reached (Frank Thomas); and his team has never, ever been a legitimate contender despite his brazen proclamations upon getting the job in 2001.
Again, amid high expectations, the Blue Jays are floundering at 35-39 and Ricciardi's job has to be in jeopardy with all the bluster, controversies and failures on and off the field. One thing about him though, he's not going to go out gracefully and if anyone's going to leave in a blaze of glory, it's Ricciardi.