3 NY Mets players testing the fans' patience as they cling to stay above .500

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Only a small number of fanbases have the luxury of not needing patience. New York Mets fans aren’t one of those batches. To survive a season, you need to accept the lows, the aggravation, and everyday stresses of 9 innings.

This year has been no exception to the norm. As fans of nearly every team experience, there are players who’ll test our patience. Right now, it’s these three members of the Mets doing their best to test ours.

1) Adrian Houser

It didn’t take long for Mets fans to grow sick of Adrian Houser. Now 4 starts, 19.1 innings, and 90 batters later, the originally-planned fifth starter has failed to impress.

Houser is 0-2 with a 7.45 ERA, 20 hits allowed, 14 walks, and only 12 strikeouts. The Mets have only won one of his starts, a 5.1 innings performance versus the Pittsburgh Pirates where he walked 5 and earned a no-decision. Houser’s induced a season-high 11 groundballs that game. Compared to his most recent outing, a beating by the bats of the Los Angeles Dodgers where he had only 3 groundballs and 13 fly balls, we easily see where the problem was.

Houser has yet to have a game where he struck out more batters than he walked. The frustration of so many walks and poor results everywhere has him in the doghouse with fans right now.

Next up for Houser will be a move to the bullpen. First, the Mets will need to have some arms back and healthy. Don’t tell this to a large number of fans. They’re ready to move him there now and call up Joey Lucchesi to see what he can do.

2) Omar Narvaez

Fans were already sick of Omar Narvaez after the little he offered the team in 2024. Brace for an even more agonizing year with him behind the plate. The recent injury to Francisco Alvarez secures we’ll see Narvaez a whole bunch more.

Now slashing .188/.235/.250 in 35 trips to the plate, Narvaez has at least shown an early spell where he can produce. That seemed to be short-lived. A double on Tuesday was his first hit in a couple of games. Getting paid $7 million to be arguably no better than Tomas Nido will wear on fans over the next two months as the pair share the catcher duties.

The biggest grind of all will be how many stolen bases Narvaez allows. Runners are 18 for 18 in attempts this year. It wasn’t until Nido gunned down a runner over the weekend that any Mets catcher was successful in this situation. The lack of ability to throw out runners has gone from frustration to sad.

When a team loses their starting catcher there's almost always a drop off in talent. It's a bit bigger for the Mets who had plans of their young rising star becoming a big part of the offense. Any solution you can think of to get through the next few weeks probably isn't good enough.

3) Francisco Lindor

Mets fans have been beyond patient with Francisco Lindor. The star shortstop has shown signs of coming out of his early slump. It’s not as far away from actually having some decent numbers as it may seem. A 4 for 4 evening is all it will take for his batting average to go from something we’d expect from a pitcher to one from a defense-first catcher. Compared to some of the other early slumps, Lindor’s hasn’t been nearly as horrendous. He has consistently put the ball in play for much of it. Eventually, we all expect him to get hot for a good stretch.

Nevertheless, you can’t mention Mets players and the testing of fans’ patience without bringing up the priciest player on the roster. Fans showed their support for him throughout last week’s homestand. While it didn’t completely kick-off a sudden surge, he has been far better.

Lindor will always be one of those divisive players on the Mets who fans either love or the. Reasonable or not, it’s what comes with a huge contract and equally as big expectations.

Because Lindor has handled himself well, fans are giving him the leeway he didn’t get in 2021. He’s now batting .174/.267/.272 on the year. Sadly, he’s not the only guy getting regular at-bats under the Mendoza Line. There’s Narvaez, of course. Brandon Nimmo and DJ Stewart recently went back into the club as well. They, too, will test our patience. Their saving grace has been some timely hits and games where they single-handedly carried the offense. Lindor needs a couple of days like them.

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3 Mets players testing the fans' patience as they cling to stay above .500

1) Adrian Houser

2) Omar Narvaez

3) Francisco Lindor

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