When it comes to bad timing, Mets win out

Bud Selig stepped to a podium at Angel Stadium a few weeks ago, calling the Angels “a model for all our other franchises.”

Jerry Manuel, the new manager of the New York Mets, stepped to a podium at Angel Stadium on Tuesday. He did not call his team a model for anything, except failure. In describing the Mets’ collapse last fall, he used two delightfully blunt words: “catastrophic demise.”

Omar Minaya, the general manager of the Mets, preceded Manuel to the podium. Minaya fired Willie Randolph just before midnight Monday, then tried to explain the timing Tuesday, with an Angels logo beneath the microphone in front of him and Angels logos all across the banner behind him.

Meet the Mets. Mock the Mets.

A model franchise whacks a manager at home, and not under cover of darkness. The Mets whacked Randolph in a suite at the Westin South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, then announced the dismissal via e-mail at 12:11 a.m.

“I know the perception is the way we handled it is disrespectful,” Minaya said. “The way it was handled -- quickly -- was out of respect to Willie.”

Minaya said rampant speculation last weekend about Randolph’s status left the Mets with “this cloud hanging over us” and compelled him to determine Randolph’s fate now, but that speculation had existed for weeks.

Minaya said his evaluation process was compromised by “sources [that] revealed my thinking.” The New York Daily News reported Saturday which two coaches were in line to be fired along with Randolph and who would replace the three men, but Minaya said he had not made a final decision and had promised Randolph on Sunday he would tell him as soon as he made one. Randolph and the Mets flew from New York to Anaheim on Sunday night.

Minaya said he slept on the decision that night, but on Monday he went into a meeting in New York before flying to California. He said he needed to get the new coaches in place and could not get a flight before noon, but the coaches already had been identified, and the 9:25 a.m. JetBlue flight from New York’s Kennedy Airport was scheduled to arrive in Long Beach at 12:26 p.m.

Randolph and the coaches headed to Angel Stadium early in the afternoon.

“I don’t believe in firing a manager at the game, in uniform,” Minaya said. “That would be more disrespect.”

And so Minaya waited for Randolph to return, after a victory, to the team hotel. Minaya chose the adjectives “resigned” and “relieved” to describe Randolph’s reaction; Randolph told reporters he was “stunned” and “surprised.”

None of this is to say that the dismissal was unjustifiable, just handled clumsily. The Mets coughed up a seven-game lead with 17 to play last September -- the “catastrophic demise” of which Manuel spoke -- and Manuel said Randolph brushed aside that collapse as last year’s news.

“I would have brought more attention to it and used it as a springboard to get us to play at a higher level,” Manuel said.

The Mets did not trade for Johan Santana so they could look up at the Florida Marlins in the standings come June, but money alone does not make a team a contender.

Of the 10 teams that opened this season with a $100-million payroll, five have a losing record. Of the 10 teams with the lowest payrolls, four have a losing record.

Selig tells every team it can win, with the magic of revenue sharing, and owners tend to believe him. The Seattle Mariners fired general manager Bill Bavasi on Monday, by daylight.

He was the second general manager dismissed this year, after the Reds fired Wayne Krivsky, and he might not be the last.

The Toronto Blue Jays are in last place in the American League East, trailing not only the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox but the Tampa Bay Rays, in what could be the eighth non-playoff season under J.P. Ricciardi.

The Washington Nationals have the worst offense in the major leagues under Jim Bowden, who traded for four outfielders -- Wily Mo Pena, Lastings Milledge, Austin Kearns and Elijah Dukes -- with a total of 10 home runs.

The Texas Rangers have traded more good pitching than they have developed under Jon Daniels, who is under evaluation by the new team president -- Nolan Ryan.

There is no indication that Ned Colletti is in trouble as of yet, but the Dodgers did not spend $119 million to stand closer to last place than to first.

Minaya spent $138 million, so he could take his turn on the firing line if firing the manager makes no difference. The Angels haven’t fired a manager or general manager in nine years, so their room full of halos should be available for the Mets’ next awkward announcement.

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bill.shaikin@latimes.com