There Goes the Neighborhood

Explaining Willie Randolph's paranoia

When asked about the possibility of race's playing a role in camera shots that show him only in stoic form that makes him appear unemotional and uninvolved, Randolph responded, "It smells a little bit."

The media pounced on his words like they came out of Jeremiah Wright's mouth. The vilification of him, the gall of him. The last thing anyone wants to hear is race and racism injected into the state of affairs of a team with the highest payroll in the National League playing under-.500 baseball months after a season-ending collapse unseen in this generation.

So even the thought that the color of one's skin could play a role – or have any legitimate bearing – on how the performance and passion of a manager is perceived by the public and thus possibly have some weight on the manager's job security is incongruous.

But not inappropriate.

-Scoop Jackson

Interesting article by Scoop Jackson . It's easy to forget how many years I would read about Willie futilely interviewing for manager positions knowing he was the token minority candidate before he got his chance when Minaya hired him. It was like an annual offseason baseball tradition for us in NY.

And you can make the argument that Minaya may have never have gotten his shot (or at least waited much longer) at the Mets GM position if it wasn't for his stint on the then MLB-owned Expos>Nationals where Bud Selig (for all his creepy faults, he sure does seem to love colored folk not named Barry Bonds) made a very public effort to place people of color in leadership roles, manager (Frank Robinson) and general manager. But even the first GM offer that the Mets made Minaya was some ridiculous power-sharing role with Jim Duquette where Duquette would handle administrative functions and Minaya would handle baseball/talent duties, a power split I don't think any MLB team has or had. It was as if they thought having successfully run the show at an underfunded mess of a franchise that the Expos were hadn't prepared him to be a full GM (I think the Expos former owner gutted everything in the offices before he sold the team, taking computers, staff, scouting data with him to the Florida Marlins). Minaya got handed a real wreck. To his credit (and pretty ballsy of him) he turned down the Mets' first watered-down job offer and fought for full autonomy, he even said as a Latino GM, he didn't want to accept anything less than full authority because of the message it might send.

It was only three-some years ago, but it was pretty wild to think that a MLB team, especially one of the richest ones, was handing the reigns of their franchise to a black dude and a Dominican dude. And as much as last season sucked, lets go back a little further to the Steve Phillips/Art Howe era *shudder* and be grateful for what they've done.

Anyway, the point is that while it may be absurd to imply that SNY is being racist in its shot selection of Willie, it's not ludicrous to think both Minaya and Randolph are subject to some extra (un)conscious bias, especially after all the shit they've been through to get where they are now.