Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor (12) is tagged out by St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Alec Burleson (41) after he was picked off during the sixth inning at Busch Stadium on April 1, 2026.
Jeff Curry-Imagn Images
Francisco Lindor is off to a slow start with the Mets. If that sounds like a sentence you’ve read before, it’s because you have.
Six games into the 2026 season, Lindor has just 3 hits in 21 at-bats, no home runs, no runs batted in, no stolen bases, and just five runs scored. Once again, the all-star shortstop and team leader is in an early spring slump, which is magnified because the rest of the lineup produced just five runs in a three-game series against the rebuilding St. Louis Cardinals, losing two of those contests.
To make matters worse, Lindor has not been his usual stellar self on the field. Wednesday’s 2-1 extra-inning loss to St. Louis was perhaps one of his worst games as a Met, having forgotten how many outs there were in the first inning and blowing a double play opportunity. “Inexcusable,” he would later say of his gaffe (h/t MLB.com).
The all-star dug the hole deeper in the sixth inning when he was picked off while Juan Soto was at the plate. Seconds later, Soto launched his first home run of the year; Lindor’s mental mistake denied the Mets a second run.
Yes, you’ve seen this Francisco Lindor movie before
Is it time to be worried about the Mets and their all-star shortstop? If history has taught us anything, the answer is a resounding no. As Yogi Berra once said, “It’s deja vu all over again.”
Last year, Lindor went 0-f0r-11 in his first three games of the season. The 2025 Mets were a disappointment thanks to a pitching staff that fell apart, but Lindor finished the year with 31 home runs, 117 runs scored and an .811 OPS.
On the way to carrying the 2024 Mets to an improbable postseason run, Lindor struggled at the plate for the first two months of the season. He started the 2024 season going just 1 for his first 31 at-bats, and his batting average was just .193 on May 31. What happened the rest of the way? He slugged 33 home runs, drove in 91 runs, had an .844 OPS, and finished second to Shohei Ohtani in the league’s MVP voting.
Lindor also had similar slow starts in 2021, his first year as a Met, and in 2023. In fact, the best start of his Mets career came four years ago, when in April 2022, he went 21-for-62 at the plate, with a .403 on-base percentage, six home runs, and 15 RBI.
The hows and whys of Lindor’s spring struggles are a mystery, but given their regularity, they should come as no surprise to any Mets fan. You can count one of Lindor’s predecessors in the shortstop role among them.
Jose Reyes, the beloved Mets shortstop for the 2006 Eastern Division championship team, posted on X (Twitter) after Wednesday’s game that everyone needs to take a deep breath when it comes to Lindor.
“Relax everybody… my guy Francisco Lindor gonna be good,” Reyes posted (h/t SNY). “Bad days happen — that’s baseball. Could happen to anyone. He’s human just like all of us. Watch how he responds… this gonna be good for him and for the organization.”
Lindor and the Mets will look to turn the corner Thursday night in San Francisco, where they begin a four-game set against the Giants.
