You should have seen Francisco Lindor‘s face on Tuesday after I told him that some pundits and tweeters were calling for Mets manager Buck Showalter to be fired. It was a reminder of why the phrase “jaw-dropping” exists.
After that, Lindor made it clear that he disagreed in the strongest possible terms with the idea that Showalter should go.
“Buck is one of the best managers in the league,” Lindor said. “One hundred percent.”
What about the notion Showalter has lost the team or the clubhouse?
“He has note lost the team,” Lindor said, emphatically. “He is still in the front. He is still holding on to the clubhouse. I told him last year, if he posts up, I’ll post up. And he had posted up every day.”
Showalter is not at risk because neither owner Steve Cohen or general manager Billy Eppler believe that he deserves to be fired. All coaches, too, are safe.
But since Lindor is an influential and respected person at every level of the organization, perhaps his strong endorsement will quiet some of the external speculation.
“Literally every phase that we have gone through, he’s done that already multiple times in his career,” Lindor continued. “He has been manager of the year. He’s had a team that wasn’t performing to the level where he was supposed to be performing.
“He is our leader. He is the one who holds us accountable day in and day out the most. And he’s the perfect guy to go through what we’re going through right now. He has helped quiet the noise a lot.”
How so? “By staying in the moment,” Lindor said. “By focusing on himself. Focusing on what we’ve got to do on a daily basis, and understanding the situations that we are going through. He is a special manager — and not just a manager, he is a special person. He is always sticking up for his players.”
What about the many mental mistakes that the team is making, I asked. Are those a reflection on the manager?
“Mental mistakes that we make are a reflection on the manager?” Lindor said rhetorically. “We are professionals. Mental mistakes are going to happen. It has nothing to do with the manager. It’s us. The manager can go out there and put a great lineup. The front can go out there and put a great lineup. If we don’t hit, or if we don’t run the bases the right way, it’s tough to win.
And how has Showalter handled the past few weeks, when the team has been losing with such regularity. How has his demeanor been?
“It has been the same,” Lindor said. “He’s frustrated for us. He is frustrated for himself as well. He is right beside us. We all feel the frustration. We all feel the urgency of winning. We are all right there. It has been a tough month. A very, very tough month.
“He has encouraged us. He has talked to us as a team. He has done everything he can in his power to push us to be better and hold us accountable.”