Laura Albanese: Mets' David Stearns put together a flawed team, and record is no surprise

ANAHEIM, Calif. — It was news only in that Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns had to spell it out, as if explaining something to a group of impatient kindergartners.

“We don’t view this as a manager problem, and we don’t intend to make a change,” Stearns told MLB.com on Friday — no doubt a calculated statement from a front-office official not exactly known for his gift of gab. “We know our record is not what we want, and we know we are capable of more.”

But anyone who’s been paying attention to this Rolls-Royce of car crashes isn’t surprised. Yes, it’s been an unusually bloody April for high-profile managers, but Carlos Mendoza isn’t quite in the same category as the deposed Alex Cora and Rob Thomson, mostly because he has the backing of people above and below him.

Stearns vocally backed Mendoza during the Mets’ cataclysmic 12-game losing streak, and though he didn’t use the exact words then that he used Friday, he made it clear that he liked the job his manager was doing.

In ways indirect and not, people around the team previously said Mendoza isn’t going anywhere; he also has the staunch support of his players.

Clarity is a good thing. With his job security under lock (for now), Mendoza can fully dedicate himself to whatever necromancy he’ll need to perform to bring this team back from the dead.

The Mets already gutted their coaching staff last season, and eradicating Mendoza actually has the potential to (somehow) make things worse. This franchise has never been known for its stability, and Mendoza, whose managerial tenure began with a five-game losing streak in 2024, often has been lauded for having a steady hand in troubling times.

Additionally, for a team already feeling a lot of pressure, maybe it’s comforting to know that Mendoza will stick around.

But there’s an added layer to Stearns’ comments. Remember the part in which he says it’s not a manager problem? Well, if not, then what?

“We’re all in this together,” Mendoza said Friday, responding to that question. “This is not one specific area. We lose together, we win together. That’s how we’ll continue to do this. I’m not going to sit here and say, ‘Well, this is the reason why.’ No. We’re all responsible and it starts with me.”

Maybe, but one thing is becoming abundantly clear: This team has good pieces but is fundamentally flawed. And though it might not be “a manager problem,” it’s certainly the manager’s problem.

Mendoza isn’t being given a reprieve as much as a chance to perform an unlikely miracle.

The Mets right now are dealing with a slew of injuries to key pieces of their roster — the most significant of which is Francisco Lindor’s calf strain — and have underperformed in nearly every facet of the game.

The travel schedule early on has been peculiarly unrelenting, highlighted by four West Coast trips baked into the first two-plus months of the season and then none after that.

Travel isn’t an excuse, and you can’t really do anything about the fact that the Mets have been a statistically unlucky team. But Stearns made some big gambles, and they’re simply not paying dividends.

A lot of fans still bemoan letting Pete Alonso walk, but based on his poor production in Baltimore, he isn’t the answer. But neither, it turns out, is this hodgepodge approach to roster construction that felt like a gamble even in February.

Many were intrigued when Stearns signed Jorge Polanco and Luis Robert Jr., and at their best, they could be part of a potent offense. But you can’t base your offense on injury-prone players and then be shocked when both come down with significant injuries. The Mets thought they could beat the streak with various forms of load management, only to discover that it takes exactly one play for someone to get hurt.

Beyond that, when historically durable players such as Lindor and Juan Soto come down with calf injuries, it’s fair to wonder about the state of the strength and conditioning staff. When an entire lineup fails to hit, it’s OK to ask if the hitting coach duo of Jeff Albert and Troy Snitker are approaching things in the best possible way.

Mendoza didn’t put it on them. “We’re in this together,” he said last week. “I feel really good with how the hitting coaches are preparing them. This is not about lack of effort, lack of preparation. The way they deliver the information is simple, it’s precise, it’s to the point. I think it’s a combination of all of us in here, but it’s not on the hitting coaches.”

One issue may be that Stearns seems convinced that he can wring more out of players than what they’ve historically shown. You saw that with the injuries to Polanco and Robert, and perhaps even in the belief that Devin Williams could be the closer he was in Milwaukee as opposed to the relief pitcher he was in the Bronx. Freddy Peralta was a fine acquisition, but anyone who looked at his track record knew that they were getting a very good, very inefficient pitcher who generally can’t take you deep into games.

Mark Vientos is hitting .237 after hitting .233 last year. Brett Baty is struggling, too, perhaps in no small part because he again has had to adapt to a new position. The bottom half of the rotation is a black hole. Bo Bichette almost certainly will come around (his expected stats show that he’s been woefully unfortunate), but Marcus Semien was pretty much a known quantity coming into this season — a 35-year-old second baseman who hasn’t hit particularly well since 2023.

In other words, Stearns went all in on the flop, and now the deck is stacked. Even on paper, the Mets don’t have a complete team. The pressure is overbearing and time is running out.

But they have this: Mendoza is sticking around, and though he isn’t the primary reason the Mets have failed, he’s now being given the chance to save a sinking ship, or go down with it until the bitter end.

By Laura Albanese

laura.albanese@newsday.com@AlbaneseLaura

Laura Albanese is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. She's been covering MLB since 2014 after starting at Newsday as an intern seven years earlier.