The Week That Was For Mets Super Employee Tony Bernazard

I wrote about this for my other blog, but wanted to summarize here, Tony Bernazard is trying to get fired George Costanza-style:

• Bernazard, the team's vice president for player development, pulled off his shirt and challenged the Double-A Binghamton Mets in the tirade, about 10 days before the All-Star break.
• Bernazard particularly went after middle infield prospect Jose Coronado, calling him a pussy
• He recently erupted at the organization's manager of baseball operations. During a game at Citi Field, scouts took their customary seats in a row behind home plate. Bernazard showed up during play and wanted a seat occupied by a D-Backs scout. Bernazard's deputy, already seated in the row, suggested to the Mets VP that he wait until the half-inning ended, to minimize the disruption. Bernazard ripped into his deputy with a profanity-laced tirade as scouts and patrons watched in disbelief.

• Bernazard also engaged on Friday in a verbal confrontation (that almost escalated to a physical confrontation) with the Mets All-Star closer, Francisco Rodriguez. According to people on the bus, Rodriguez made a friendly gesture toward family members of his fellow reliever Pedro Feliciano that Bernazard might have misinterpreted. They argued in Spanish, and the dispute escalated to the point that there seemed to be a danger of a physical altercation, one witness said.

• Also, this wasn't included in the past blog post, but wanted to add it here, via the New York Times: In more recent seasons, Bernazard’s conduct has come into question. He was widely portrayed as someone who, intentionally or not, undercut the former manager Willie Randolph by lingering in the Mets’ clubhouse and building his own relationships with players.Bernazard’s public fraternization with Manny Acta, then the Washington Nationals’ manager, infuriated Randolph, who felt that Bernazard, in effect, was implying that Acta should be managing the Mets. Bernazard said that he was friendly with other managers as well.

The Mets need to fire this man. The team is in disarray and the organization seems to be in disarray. This behavior cannot be tolerated. If he's allowed to stay, what happens if Gary Sheffield challenges a fan to a WWE-style wrestling match? Or if David Wright goes after a reporter and calls him a pussy? Or if Jose Reyes went into a profanity-laced tirade in front of fans? They could just say: "well Bernazard did it and he wasn't fired."

The Mets really need to clean house. The trainers and medical staff should all be replaced. Jerry Manual should be shown the door. And General Manager Omar Minaya should go with Bernazard. Especially if he knew about this for weeks and swept it under the rug. Plus, some of the team's lack of depth has to be put on his shoulders. He accessed this team in spring training and said that they had enough to win and that they had enough depth. Even if they had all the players who were on the DL, would they be a contender? I don't know. 

But right now, they are a PR and HR disaster as well as being an NL disaster. And Jeff Wilpon cannot continue to allow this to happen.