Stearns on Lindor’s year: ‘Up there with anything’

NEW YORK — The Mets began Tuesday a half-game out of a playoff spot, 10 games over .500 for the first time all season. It’s a position that seemed unimaginable when Jorge Lopez threw his glove into the crowd at Citi Field as the team fell to 11 games under .500 in late May.

It has been a turnaround filled with good vibes, an improved starting rotation and a deep lineup led by shortstop Francisco Lindor, who has discarded a poor start to the season to become Shohei Ohtani’s chief competition for NL MVP.

“It’s been an unbelievable season to watch,” Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns said Tuesday. “We’re getting to the point, I think, where we’re talking about perhaps the greatest individual position player season in the history of this franchise. I’ve been around some really special seasons. Been around some MVP seasons. This is right up there with anything I’ve seen on a day-to-day basis.”

Sterns’ principal duty is constructing a roster based on player value assessments. What does the most valuable player look like?

“I think he looks like the guy who runs out at shortstop at 7 o’clock,” Stearns said, referring to Lindor, with a smile.

Stearns’ take, of course, is biased — and seemingly in the minority.

Ohtani is having a historic offensive campaign in his first year with the Los Angeles Dodgers, owners of the best record in baseball. He leads the NL in home runs, slugging, OPS, OPS+, runs scored and total bases. He is already the first player in MLB history with 44 home runs and 46 stolen bases in a season. At this point, it’s a matter of when, not if, he becomes the first player to ever post a 50-50 season.

He is the overwhelming favorite to win NL MVP after winning the award in the AL twice with the Angels.

But Ohtani, rehabbing from elbow surgery, has been the Dodgers’ designated hitter all season and won’t pitch again until 2025. And therein lies the top argument in the case for Lindor: He plays defense — at an elite level at a premium position, at that — and Ohtani hasn’t played it all.

Lindor’s contributions on both sides is why he holds the NL lead in fWAR (7.0) over Ohtani (6.6). He began Tuesday batting .271 with 29 home runs and an .835 OPS while starting all 138 of the Mets’ games at shortstop. Those numbers include a horrendous start to the season that left him off the NL All-Star team. The results flipped when he was moved up to the leadoff spot on May 18; he was batting .305 with 22 home runs and a .926 OPS in 94 games since the switch entering Tuesday.

Defensive metrics are far less exact, but his 17 outs above average were second among major league shortstops — behind Kansas City Royals star Bobby Witt Jr. Then there are his intangibles as a veteran universally regarded as a top-notch leader.

“I think that’s part of the entire package that he brings,” Stearns said. “And it’s easy to quantify what he does on the field and that’s really impressive. It’s much harder to quantify the impact he has both by what he says and also by how he acts. He works so hard. He takes so much pride in, not only in his preparation, but also ensuring that his teammates prepare appropriately. And it’s the entire package that I think allows him to contribute so much to the organization.”

Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora beamed talking about Lindor in the other dugout Tuesday. He recalled meeting Lindor in Puerto Rico as a minor league player when Lindor was a little leaguer. He knows the Lindor family, also from the city of Caguas, well. Lindor’s re-emergence as an MVP candidate in his fourth season in New York invokes pride.

“He’s just an impactful individual,” Cora said. “There’s a vibe about him that not too many guys have at the big league level. From the walk-up song, [when] this place is going nuts, to his smile to the energy to the commitment to the structure to the discipline. This kid is on point with everything. Just to watch him play, it brings joy to us. We love watching him play.

Does he think Lindor is the NL MVP?

“I’m glad that I don’t have to vote,” Cora said. “But both of them [are] game changers. We saw Othani earlier in the season. There’s a lot of good players in the National League.

“Obviously, at the end of the day, playoff stuff is going to come into play. I don’t think that’s necessarily something that voters need to take into consideration because if you have a great season and you’re in the fight all the way to the end, hey, you did something great. But it’ll be interesting. But the kid is doing everything.”