New York Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor isn’t ready to give up on this season just yet.
Though the Mets sunk to the bottom of the NL East just weeks into the season and have lingered there throughout the summer, Lindor said he still has hopes that things can turn around. After the team’s win over the Pittsburgh Pirates, Lindor recalled another past team that turned a torrid summer run into a playoff spot.
Francisco Lindor Holding Out Hope for the Mets
As Mike Puma of the New York Post reported, Lindor grew reminiscent of his 2017 Cleveland squad that went on a 22-game win streak starting in late August and running through the final stretch of the season.
Lindor said he carries that memory into this season with the Mets.
“It just reminds you crazy things like that can happen,” Lindor said on Friday. “It’s almost like it’s real, not this foreign concept of like it didn’t happen.”
The Mets would likely need something even greater, however. Puma noted that Fangraphs gave the team a 0.1% chance of making the playoffs, and even a 22-game winning streak might not put them in a playoff spot by the end.
The Mets been on the wrong side of those odds in the past. In 2007, the team held a 7-game lead in the NL East with 17 games remaining, but lost 12 of their final 17 games. Statistical models like Baseball Prospectus had given the Mets odds of 99.8% to make the playoffs that year, they were eliminated on the final day of the regular season.
The Mets were one of the most dedicated sellers at the recently passed MLB trade deadline, moving several players on expiring contracts, though there have been some lingering rumors that they could move on from Lindor in the coming winter as well.
CBS Sports reporter Mike Axisa named Lindor as a likely candidate to move in the offseason.
âHe has a full no-trade clause and is owed $160 million from 2027-31, which are two enormous obstacles,â Axisa wrote. âThat is especially true with a new collective bargaining agreement coming and the sportâs economic structure expected to change. Itâll be hard to move that contract before knowing if a salary cap is being introduced, a different version of revenue sharing, etc. There have been enough rumblings the last few weeks that we have to mention Lindor as a trade candidate, though. I donât expect this to fade into the background.â
Another Former Mets Player Believes
Though the Mets traded pitcher Luke Weaver to the Pirates before this week’s trade deadline, he agreed with Lindor that the team could still make a miracle run to the playoffs. He noted that the Boston Red Sox went from 13 games below .500 to 13 games over.
“You [lose] these next three and then you go on your run,” Weaver told the New York Post. “As someone who did care, I think we look at a team like the Red Sox, and we see it’s really cool from a distance and what is possible. We have history books to show other reasons, and they are creating their own history right now.
Like HEAVY’s content? Be sure to follow us.
This article was originally published on HEAVY
The post Mets Francisco Lindor Shares Bold Statement on Team’s Future appeared first on HEAVY.