In that regard and in connection with the basic issue of this particular blog, while I think it’s too early to weigh in on Jerry Manuel’s performance, I will say that I believe the competitiveness of the Mets that’s been evident over the last several games since Willie’s departure is due to Manuel’s influence. I won’t bore you with the details of how he’s different from Willy but just to sort of short list’em: Manuel is fired up and shows it on the field; he’s made bold moves and appears intent on making more in order to find a formula that will make this team at least incrementally more successful, and he’s publicly saying not-so-subtle, indeed, provacative things that let you and his players know that he expects more out of this team and will do what it takes to get that more.

The one thing that I see from Manuel that I like the most at this point is that his own ego isn’t nearly as boldly on display as Willy’s was. He’s willing to let his ego go whereas Willy was not. As stated in the Comment by the blogger identified as “Gland” above (2008-07-07 12:08:04), Manuel: “seems more comfortable with himself than Willie did. Willie seemed like he was a bit insecure and he was trying to cover it by being stoic and being ‘a winner.’”

To add to this point by Gland about Willy’s insecurity, he seemed to me to be always sort of competing on an ego level with his own players. As bizarre as it sounds — to me there was always a kind of undercurrent or subtext to Willy’s comments through which you could perceive that he was trying to show us all that he was a better ball player than any of the players on the Mets roster even though he was the manager and was no longer competing on the field. You could just feel it. In addition, as Gland sort of indicated above, because of his insecurity Willy was always sort of trying to show off his Yankee pedigree in an effort to impress.

Along the same lines, one of Willy biggest faults I think, indeed perhaps his biggest, was that he tried to emulate Joe Torre’s managerial style but didn’t have a team with the offensive talent that Torre’s Yankees did.

I must say I am not a Yankees fan — in fact, put lightly, I’m the antithesis of same. But, let’s face it, the Yankees have paid for 5 or 6 of the 10 to 20 best offensive players in baseball, and as high as the Mets payroll may be right now they have not flat-out bought that quanitity or quality level of offensive talent. Joe Torre’s laid back style was a product of the fact that as Yankees’ manager he could sit back and wait for all that offensive talent to start winning games because, over the long haul, it would eventually come around and do so in big way. Willy wasn’t in the same position because he didn’t have that volume or quality of offensive talent but he always managed as if he did.

Playing “his guys” Agbayani and Timo Perez in the playoffs killed us in 00 worse than leaving that bum Mota in for one inning in game 2 of the NLCS…oh and when given guys like Alomar, Vaughn, Rickey and all the other guys who we now have Delgado, Alou and Castillo as replicas…Bobby V managed to do much much much worse than Willie ever did….oh yeah, and Bobby V had talent in his pens, whereas the Mets havent had any since Duaner went down in 06….he’s a shell of himself and the other guys just aint too great either…

Yeah, revise it again.

I fail to see what’s personal about it, and it’s not going to continue, despite your best attempts.

Considering this media market and the loud passion of the fans, Omar and the Wilpons should have seen this coming as opposed to making Willie walk the plank for nearly 80+ games this season. Willie was in a no win situation, and should have been cut last October.