Torborg Replaced by Green : Baseball: Mets wait until after game, then hire a disciplinarian to rejuvenate team after dismal start.

Jeff Torborg, whose New York Mets have the worst record in baseball except for the expansion Colorado Rockies, was fired as manager Wednesday night and replaced by Dallas Green.

“I wanted to give him a full year. When it wasn’t happening, I wanted to wait until the All-Star break,” said General Manager Al Harazin, who waited until after the Mets’ come-from-behind 6-4 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates to announce the change.

“But after losing three in Montreal last weekend, I couldn’t wait any longer. I saw no indication that things were turning around.”

New York was fifth last year, in Torborg’s initial season, with a 72-90 record, and this year was even worse. New York’s 13-25 start is only one game better than that of the 1962 expansion Mets--the worst team in modern major league history.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t get them to play,” Torborg said after talking to his team. “We didn’t play well. We earned where we are.

“I thought about it tonight during the game. I thought that maybe some new face would turn it around.”

New York won in Torborg’s last game by rallying for three runs in the ninth inning against reliever Stan Belinda, then getting Bobby Bonilla’s two-run home run in the 10th.

While Torborg has been criticized for being too passive and almost too nice, Green is loud and confrontational.

“I’m not sure I have the answers that Jeff Torborg doesn’t,” Green said this week. “I know our styles will be different. My style is different than a lot of people’s.”

The Mets also fired first base coach Barry Foote and bullpen coach Dave LaRoche. Darrell Johnson, a former major league manager, will fill one of the two vacancies.

Green, 58, was working for the Mets as a scout. He has a 225-195 record as a manager, leading the Philadelphia Phillies from 1979-1981 and the New York Yankees for the first three-quarters of the 1989 season. In 1979 he led the Phillies to their only World Series title.

Green, who also was general manager of the Chicago Cubs from 1982-87, will manage the Mets for the first time Friday night against the Atlanta Braves.