A cynic would say Willie Randolph’s public apology to the Wilpons and SNY before yesterday’s drubbing in Atlanta was just a desperate attempt to keep his job.

Fortunately, I haven’t been that hardened, yet.

After covering Randolph over the past four seasons, I think the Mets skipper was sincere when he took out a pad and told the beat writers at Turner Field:

“I want to apologize to Met ownership, SNY, and my team for the unnecessary distraction that I created ... that I've caused the last couple of days. I shouldn't have said what I said. It was a mistake.

"The fact of life is that we haven't been playing very well as a team. We've been very inconsistent, and what happens is, you're going to get criticized for that. I understand that. It's been a tough couple of months, and I expect a lot from my team and from myself. ... I take full responsibility for what I said out of frustration, and hope that we can put closure to this matter and focus on winning some baseball games. That's what we're here to do, win a championship, win some games.

"I just wanted to publicly apologize, and I take full responsibility for what happened a couple of days ago. Those guys have a job to do and they get paid a lot of money to do their job, so what I feel about that is really not important. At the time, I voiced an opinion, out of frustration most of it.

"We have a job to do and I'm going to focus on doing my job.”

That being said, Randolph should have known better.

After criticizing SNY in The Record of Hackensack, NJ, Randolph was back in the forefront. Now, he said on WFAN, he thought his conversation with Ian O’Connor was off the record, but the manager should have known there was a possibility his chat would wind up in the paper.

O’Connor is an excellent reporter and this is the second story the reporter broke in the past year that caused a fallout maelstrom. If you remember, the columnist had a chat with George Steinbrenner, before Game 4 of the ALDS last October. He got the ailing Boss to admit Joe Torre would be replaced if the Yankees didn’t advance.

Randolph obviously knew about that story and why O’Connor, on Sunday, was asking him his line of questions. The columnist did it before the game where there were 20-25 reporters covering the Mets. Getting that story through all of that competition was just good reporting by the New York veteran. If the manager wanted to keep his words private, he should have told O’Connor the conversation was off the record.

Frankly this is all spilt milk, because the fact remains, Randolph said those comments about SNY, the Mets and the media covering them. Now damage control has to start with the manager taking the first step. Unfortunately, though, the best elixir for this latest trouble spot is winning and in the last three days, the Amazins’ were not so…well amazing.

Outscored 23-7 in three games, the Mets went back to their mediocre ways, while losing 2/3rds of the their outfield to boot. After Ryan Church suffered a concussion on the last play of the double header, Moises Alou removed himself from this game with a leg cramp. It’s not known when either player will play regularly again, which desperately hurts the ailing team and manager.

Fortunately for Randolph, no one in the NL East is running away with the division and the Mets are sitting just 3.5 games out of first with a .500 record. Because the division is still close, Randolph has time. The Wilpons will only relieve the manager of his duties if the team needs a desperate jolt.

Yet every day and every loss brings the Mets closer to that deadline. And you don’t have to be a cynic to see that.