"He’ll be fine" doesn’t apply to these 3 struggling NY Mets players

There's no shortage of New York Mets players who are struggling as the team tumbles down the standings and racks up the losses. That's no surprise; having too many guys not playing well is a recipe for losing baseball. However, standing here in mid-April, it becomes easy to take a look at small samples and wave away the concern.

That excuse is wearing thin, as the end of April will start to bring representative samples that start to display trends rather than random statistical noise. Still, there can sense that a slumping player will bounce back even as the innings and at-bats stack up. Juan Soto's brutal start to 2025 is a perfect example of this, and for Mets fans, the recency of that can lead to an unnecessary feeling of calm during the scuffles.

Trying to determine who will be fine and who has already proven that they'll be a disappointment isn't an easy task. It's not quite scientific, but the most important thing that one can consider is the past track record and the trends that it highlights. On top of that, the current context is important. A struggling 35-year-old presents a much different case than a 25-year-old who hasn't yet gotten on track.

These three struggling Mets are showing us who they really are in 2026

Mark Vientos

Vientos is showing us that he shouldn't be trusted, and his performance has been woefully inept recently. Coming off a disappointing 2025 campaign, we're already starting to see some troubling trends develop with the once-promising slugger.

Through April 16, Vientos is slashing .239/.265/.348, which is even worse than his .233/.289/.413 line from a year ago. Here's why we can't believe in him moving forward. He's chasing pitches out of the zone and whiffing overall at the same rates as he did last season. His chase rate was 32.8% in 2025 versus 32.7% this year, while he whiffed at a 32.5% clip in 2025 versus 34.8% in 2026. With that, his hard-hit rate has fallen from 50.5% to 35.3%. Even if the hard contact comes back, the lack of strike zone discipline and bat-to-ball skills ensures he won't surpass last year's performance. Throw in his shoddy defense, and he's basically a replacement-level player.

David Peterson

Since 2024, David Peterson has provided a clinic on the value of expected stats over actual production as a predictive measure. The 2024 version of the southpaw produced like a potential front-end starter with a 2.90 ERA, but his xERA of 4.59 suggested that he wasn't much more than a fringe fifth starter. In 2025, he posted an xERA of 4.59 again, but this time, he only produced a 4.22 ERA.

Now in 2026, his xERA is up to 5.00 while his ERA has ballooned to 6.41. That will likely come down some, but the chances of Peterson producing like an ace-like figure again are slim. The reason why Peterson's xERA has always been high is due to the quality of contact he allows. His hard hit rate has only gone up, from 42.7% in 2024 to 46% in 2025 to 55.4% so far in 2026. He's still generating ground balls like a madman, but if they're rockets, it will be death by a thousand paper cuts.

What's really happening here is Peterson is starting to show us who he really is, and overall, it's not great. This has been a trend dating back to the second half of last season, lending even more credence to the fact that he's

Marcus Semien

The Mets might have primarily brought Marcus Semien here for his glove and for the vibes, but there was at least some hope that he'd hit around a league-average clip. With a .211/.269/.296 line, that certainly hasn't been the case.

As a 35-year-old who has already been on the downswing, there's already reason to believe that he won't be fine, and the way that aging is manifesting itself only proves that he is who he is now.

First, there's his average bat speed, which was already a bottom-tier number coming in at 68.4 miles per hour last year. So far this season, he's lost almost one additional mile per hour, posting a sixth percentile mark of 67.6 miles per hour. That doesn't sound like much of a drop, but it is.

His slowing bat means he has to start his swing earlier, which has impacted his ability to recognize pitches out of the zone and make contact overall. Semien has seen his chase rate spike from 23.4% to 28.6%, while his whiff rate has gone up from 22.6% to 24.6%, year over year. That's led to a jump in strikeout rate from 17.4% to 20.3% and a dip in walk rate from 9.4% to 6.8%. Overall, he's swinging at more junk, whiffing more often, and tends to be in-between when making contact.

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