Francisco Lindor's back is still sore, and so the Mets wait
Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor in the dugout during the fifth inning of a game against the Phillies at Citi Field on Thursday. Credit: Noah K. Murray
We’ve heard this one before.
The Mets say a player has some minor ailment, and the days tick by as he stays off the injured list. Eventually, someone admits that it’s more serious than originally believed, so an IL stint is warranted. Weeks pass, then months. And then no one ever hears from him again (more or less).
It’s the Ballad of Jed Lowrie, but we’ve seen it happen to Jacob deGrom and Yoenis Cespedes and, in its most tragic form, David Wright. It’s long been a dark joke around these parts. The phrase “day-to-day” might as well be stamped on the football Lucy pulls away from Charlie Brown.
So of course, the news that Francisco Lindor was day-to-day with a back injury sent a chill down the spine of the entire fan base (pun absolutely intended).
And sure, there was a good bit of whiplash Friday. In the afternoon, the Mets’ MVP candidate strode to the cage with two bats in hand, lined up on the right side of the plate, laid down a few bunts and took a few hacks.
“Hey, Francisco, how are you feeling?’’
“Feeling great,” he responded, jogging away with some semblance of agility.
But afterward, some of that joy was tempered. It turns out Lindor was feeling better because on Thursday, he received a “facet injection” — essentially a shot meant to numb and treat lumbar pain. The back wasn’t healing as quickly as he had hoped, Lindor said Friday evening, and “it didn’t feel like I could get back sooner rather than later.”
So now we wait.
We wait to see if Lindor’s injury will follow the dark path of those who came before him, or if this charmed season has just a little bit more magic left in it. It’s a roller coaster with no guardrails, and the Mets and Lindor are staring straight ahead at the big drop at the end.
They lost to the Phillies, 12-2, on Friday night, but Atlanta lost to the Marlins, meaning the Mets remained two games ahead for the final wild-card spot with eight to play.
This is a fistfight in a hall of mirrors, and there’s no telling where the next week will bring them.
If there’s some slight solace, it’s that the team has done well in Lindor’s absence. Still, Carlos Mendoza said there is no temptation to keep resting him if the Mets open a bigger cushion in the wild-card race.
“He’s Francisco Lindor,” he said. “We’re talking about a potential MVP here. When he says he’s ready to go, it doesn’t matter where we’re at. He’s in the lineup.”
President of baseball operations David Stearns was asked flat out if he thinks we’ll see Lindor again this year. He didn’t even let the question end before responding, “Yeah. Yeah.”
Still, there’s so much uncertainty.
Lindor said he heard different things about how this shot could work in his favor. Some people feel better after a few days; others, in a few weeks. Some feel better immediately.
“It wasn’t the one where you hit it and it’s gone,” he said, smiling. “But I’m hoping [it’s one of the others]. At some point, it’s going to heal.”
Hope is a tricky thing — and often it feels like a surefire path to heartbreak. But you have to give the Mets this: They’ve spent the entire season defying the odds.
After falling 11 games under .500 at 24-35, they entered Friday at 85-68, a season-high 17 games over .500. Since that low-water mark on June 2, they had gone 61-33, and their .649 winning percentage in that span was the best in the majors.
They need Lindor to be part of that story. Too often this week, it’s felt as if his injury was even more severe than the team was letting on. Up until Friday evening, Mendoza’s updates had been somewhat vague. And despite a clean MRI and CT scan, Lindor has walked gingerly, his usual smile a little more strained than usual.
There’s also the fact that this is Lindor we’re talking about. This is a guy who played through a broken finger in 2022 and put together a 30-30 season in 2023 while quietly nursing a bone spur in his right elbow that required offseason surgery. That was the season he stayed up with his wife, who gave birth at 5:30 a.m., and came in to pinch hit in the ninth inning later that night. He doesn’t sit unless he’s really, really hurt.
He said as much Friday.
“I’m not worried but I’m antsy,” he said. “I hate not having cleats. I hate not being able to be available for my teammates and hopefully I can wake up tomorrow and say, ‘Man, I’m good to play.’ ”
So it comes down to medical science, it comes down to Lindor’s dogged will to play, and, as it often does at this time of year, it comes down to hope — hope that this time, for the first time in a long time, things will be different.
We all know the old song and dance. The Mets hope Lindor can change the tune completely.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.