I’m a bit of a baseball fan… check that, I’m a HUGE baseball fan. In earlier years I traveled all over the country seeing games places that don’t even have a team anymore or in stadiums that have been torn down!
I’m a Mets fan and this season has been painful to say the least. Two years ago (well almost two years ago) the Mets let go of my favorite manager, Buck Showalter. I had been a Yankee fan earlier in life and after the ’95 season the Yankees let go of Showalter, signed someone to replace Don Mattingly (another favorite of mine) and they also let go of Jack McDowell and Mike Stanley and some other players I liked and I had had it. I suffered through the eighties and the revolving door of managers, I suffered through Bucky Dent, Stump Merrill, Ed Whitson, Pascal Perez and a whole host of dysfunction all presided over by ‘The Boss’ (George Steinbrenner) and I had it.
So, I switched allegiances and became a Mets fan.
For the most part, I’m glad I made the switch. Yeah, the Yankees won four of the next five World Series but the truth of it was that Yankee stadium and going to games there was not at all pleasant or fun. I mean it was embarrassing and that hasn’t really changed in the time since. I can remember taking a woman I worked with to a game and a group of drunken guys just acting out. It was something that happens a lot in Yankee stadium where more than a few fans take going to a game as an opportunity to get totally plastered and then see who can act out more outrageously than the next guy.
Going to games at Shea (and later Citifield) just had a different atmosphere. Even my cousin who is a dyed in wool Yankee fan and father of two girls was reluctant to take his girls to a Yankee game and would rather take them to a Mets game.
But… getting back to the topic at hand.
Pretty much every single player in New York Sports get pilloried for bad performance. This happens even more if a player happens to be a highly paid superstar. There isn’t a single player that’s immune no matter how good said player is… I’ve heard fans actually speak ill of Aaron Judge (who is a generational player). They all get it though, the big stars… Juan Soto, Gerrett Cole, Pete Alonso but there is one guy who is immune and I simply cannot for the life of me understand why because he doesn’t deserve not to be held accountable.
That player? Francisco Lindor.
Lindor is the second highest paid player on the Mets this year but Lindor has been the highest paid position player since 2021 and over the last few years ’22, ’23, ’24 he’s been the highest paid player on the team.
The thing is… Lindor has a multiyear contract that runs through his age 37 season meaning there are SIX MORE YEARS on that contract where he gets paid $34.1 million each season. Lindor is in fact the highest paid shortstop in the game. The problem is that the team isn’t just responsible for the $34.1 million it pays Lindor, no… the Mets ALSO PAY $4,825,150 in luxury taxes because they are a three time offender over the luxury tax threshold. It means Lindor costs the Mets $38,925,150 this season. That would be bad enough but in addition to that the Mets ALSO TAKE A HIT IN THEIR DRAFT POSITION moving to a lower position in the draft due to exceeding the threshold.
Last year and this year, I keep saying that the Mets should trade Lindor. People look at me as if I’m insane when I say this because as they say “YOU CAN’T TRADE LINDOR!!!!!!”
And I think to myself, how can I not trade Lindor? First off, he’s 31 years old and I have yet to see a single baseball player, especially a shortstop who has gotten better defensively as they’ve gotten older. Lindor is a very good but NOT GREAT shortstop.
The last time the Mets went to a World Series in 2015… you know who their shortstop was? It was Wilmer Flores! Yep, they got there with Wilmer Flores providing the bulk of the shortstop duties that season. As a matter of fact just for the hell of it, I looked at Flores offensive numbers this season and when you give Flores the same number of plate appearances Lindor has gotten the two compare rather closely outside of one area and that’s stolen bases.
Only Flores is making $3,500,000 or less than a tenth of what Lindor makes.
The other thing is that the Mets HAVE A YOUNG SHORTSTOP! There is a log jam on the left side of the infield because Lindor can ONLY PLAY SHORTSTOP! The Mets have Acuna though and also Ronny Mauricio who have both played shortstop! They are both making major league minimum.
The other day I called into a sports talk show and the producer wouldn’t even put me on because I said the Mets should pass Lindor through waivers.
When you pass a player through waivers, another team can select him but they become responsible for the remainder of his contract. That’s around $234 million in diminishing returns! I would bet another team wouldn’t go for it but if they did you’d be rid of the contract. Unfortunately, the Mets can’t do that without Lindor’s consent.
In the meantime Lindor just keeps striking out, refusing to sit even when he should rest because he’s too worried about his job. Batting in the leadoff spot even though he strikes out more and sees less pitches than Brandon Nimmo who he replaced at the top of the order. And not a single writer or talking head actually calls him out for his shitty performance.
Lindor had a great season last year, maybe the best season of his career and that was the time to trade him! You sell when the value of something is high! What’s funny is it was pretty easy to find this article:
The answer was NO! And because the manager feels compelled to keep indulging this player we see game after game where the offense sputters because the hand puppet of a manager won’t put Lindor down in the six or seven hole in the batting order.
Anyway… tonight Lindor hit two homers. TRADE HIM NOW! PLEASE!!!! I keep thinking about Carlos Beltran who played for the Mets for 7 years and is considered one of the best players to put on the uniform. He won 3 gold gloves, 2 silver sluggers, was a five time all star and you know what the Mets won while Beltran was a Met? Well they won the division series against the Dodgers in 2006 and then lost the NL Championship series against the Cardinals and that was it for seven years.
I’m beginning to see a lot of Beltran in Lindor.
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