MLB

RANDOLPH’S ON A ROCKY ROAD

DENVER – Met GM Omar Minaya made a surprise visit here yesterday, but it wasn’t to fire Willie Randolph.

At least not yet.

Minaya did the exact opposite, in fact, giving his embattled manager another vote of confidence before the Mets fell to 22-24 and extended their skid to a season-high five games by dropping a 6-5 decision to the Rockies in 13 innings.

MORE METS: No Holliday For Amazin’s In Colorado

MORE: Complete Mets Coverage

MORE: Mets Blog

While not taking him off the hot seat entirely, Minaya made it clear Randolph’s job is safe – for the time being.

“Willie’s our manager, guys,” Minaya said during an interview in the fourth inning. “I fully support Willie, and hopefully Willie will be our manager for many years.”

The comments were Minaya’s first since the Mets dropped below .500 with four consecutive losses in Atlanta this week while Randolph was embroiled in controversy over statements about race and the team’s own TV network.

It was the second time in eight days that Minaya gave Randolph a vote of confidence in response to the Mets’ disappointing stumble out of the gate and calls for his job.

Minaya, however, confirmed that Randolph will meet with himself, team owner Fred Wilpon and chief operating officer Jeff Wilpon shortly after the Mets return to open a homestand on Monday.

Minaya said the Wilpons, who refused to take Randolph’s call of apology this week, want their manager to explain himself in person.

“The way we decided to do it was, let’s get through this week, then get back to New York and look each other in the eye,” Minaya said.

“Basically, sit down in a room and let Willie have a conversation with the ownership and myself and tell us a little bit about how he felt and why those things were said.”

Minaya said he was miffed by Randolph’s comments to The Record of Hackensack, comments in which Randolph hinted that racism motivated critics of his performance and that SNY unfairly portrayed him as too stoic with its choice of camera angles.

“When I first heard about it, I wanted to read them myself,” Minaya said of the interview. “I think he explained himself and apologized. What I told Willie was, you made a mistake. But we all make mistakes.”

Minaya said he decided to fly to Denver for this weekend’s series with the Rockies after watching the Mets lose their first three games in Atlanta following a two-game sweep at Yankee Stadium.

“The team is not playing well, and I think sometimes as a general manager you’ve got to see how the team is playing,” Minaya said.

For his part, Randolph downplayed Minaya’s visit, the news of which admittedly surprised the Met manager.

“That’s nice, but I’m not concerned about that,” Randolph said after the game when told of Minaya’s endorsement. “I’m more interested in winning a ballgame.”

Randolph said he realizes he is in hot water if the Mets don’t turn things around starting this weekend against the struggling Rockies. At the same time, Randolph insisted he is not distracted by the talk of his job security.

“I’m still here, and I’m just hell-bent on getting a win,” he said. “I can’t control anything outside of that or the [perception] that I’m on the hot seat and everyone is talking about that.

“That’s irrelevant to me. I don’t feel any differently than I felt last week. There’s been a lot going on, obviously, but my main focus is on winning ballgames.”

Amid that tumultuous backdrop, the Mets players tried to block out the noise and regroup. David Wright, though, indicated the players aren’t overly sympathetic to Randolph’s plight because they know Randolph wouldn’t want that.

“He’s a New Yorker, he’s knows what’s going on and he knows when he signed up for this job that there was going to be a lot of scrutiny,” Wright said. “The finger has to be pointed at somebody. That’s just the nature of the beast.”

bhubbuch@nypost.com