Bobby Valentine can see himself coming back to manage the Mets, but not under the current circumstances.
Valentine’s name is being run through the rumor mill as a possible replacement if Willie Randolph gets axed. But Valentine, who played minor-league ball with Randolph in Charleston, said now is not the right time to return to Flushing.
“I think Willie is going to turn that thing around and have a wonderful managerial career,” Valentine said on WFAN’s midday show with Joe Benigno and Evan Roberts. “Whether or not I end up back in MLB or in New York that will (be) somebody else’s offer and then my decision to have to make afterwards, but right now I am where I am and I have a job.”
Valentine lasted six years with the Mets, but was fired after the 2002 season and returned to Japan to manage the Chiba Lotte Marine in the Japanese Pacific League. Art Howe replaced Valentine and lasted two seasons before Randolph took over for him.
Valentine said he does plan on returning to the States someday. If it’s in New York, or any other city, does not matter to him.
“I would say the only place I would go is a place where I felt really wanted,” Valentine said during the interview. “The things that I do and the things that I bring to the table is exactly what the organization, the team, the town needs. I think that will happen someday, somewhere. Wherever it is it won’t be because of the location on the map, it will because the pieces fit in the puzzle of my life.”
Valentine is the only Mets manager to take the team to consecutive playoff trips. After losing the NLCS to the BRaves in 1999, the Mets went to the 2000 World Series, where they lost to the Yankees in five games.
Valentine told WFAN he sees Randolph’s Mets going further than he ever took them.
“I think it’s their year. I think it’s destiny for this team,” Valentine said. “I see the Yankees making a run, but I can see the Mets making a run that gets them to the World Series and a win in the World Series.”
He is more optimistic than most Mets’ fans. Randolph’s job has come under scrutiny as the team has underperformed on the heels of last season’s historic collapse, when they blew a seven-game division lead with 17 games left.
Some thought Randolph would be fired Monday during a much-hyped meeting with GM Omar Minaya and owners Fred and Jeff Wilpon, but Randolph survived and the Mets have won two of three heading into tonight’s matchup with the Dodgers.
But Randolph did not get a guarantee he would remain the manager for the remainder of the season.
Valentine has had contact with the Mets recently, but not for what you would think. Besides leading a team in Japan, Valentine oversees a team in Korea and is interested in one of the Mets’ prospects for that team.
“The only communication I have had or will have with the Mets in the next week is about the possibility of getting one of their Triple-A players to one of my Korean teams,” Valentine said.
Valentine seemed happy in Japan and joked with the radio hosts about bidding for the manager’s door that Bobby Bonilla threw a chair at when he was there. But Japan is not the major leagues.
“There’s times I miss the wonderful stadiums and the great fans,” Valentine said. “The MLB thing is the best in the world. There is no doubt about that and there’s times I will look up at the scorecard and think this isn’t as good as MLB.
“But I sink my teeth into anything that I am doing and my teeth are well into what I am doing here. I love what I am doing and I don’t have a lot of time to think if the grass is greener.”