Francisco Lindor homers twice, gets 'M-V-P!' chants in Mets' win over Padres

SAN DIEGO — Two thousand, seven hundred and ninety-nine miles from Queens, the chants were loud and clear Saturday night.

Francisco Lindor hit two home runs, including a grand slam, in the Mets’ 7-1 win over the Padres. After each, the visiting fans down the third-base line at Petco Park united in their exclamations, expressing an increasingly relevant sentiment: “M-V-P! M-V-P!”

“The Mets fans travel well,” Lindor said.

The shortstop probably isn’t the frontrunner for the National League honor — say hello to the Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani, who has 41 homers and 40 steals and may well record baseball’s first 50/50 season — but Lindor has injected himself into the conversation. That he even can be put forth as a non-Ohtani candidate is a testament to his scorching summer after a slow spring.

“We’re witnessing greatness here,” manager Carlos Mendoza said. “One of the best players in the game. I think a lot of times people take for granted how good of a player [Lindor is] and what he’s able to do day in and day out.”

Lindor went deep from both sides of the plate, hitting a grand slam off righthander Michael King in the fourth and a solo shot off lefthander Yuki Matsui in the seventh. “That means my body aligned perfectly today,” Lindor said. “It’s one of those where as you run the bases, like, wow, my swing is good.”

With 27 homers, Lindor is tied with Pete Alonso for most on the team. He also leads the Mets with 78 RBIs. Combine those with a .269 average, an .831 OPS and high-level defense at an up-the-middle-position and you have one of the best seasons in the majors this year — and, at minimum, Lindor’s best season since he joined the Mets in 2021.

“I see a guy that is having fun,” Mendoza said.

Lindor leads the league with 6.4 wins above replacement, according to FanGraphs. Ohtani, limited to DH duty all year as he recovers from Tommy John surgery, is second with 6.1. The Reds’ Elly De La Cruz (5.6) and Diamondbacks’ Ketel Marte (5.4 and injured) are next. Mendoza said: “He needs to be in the conversation. He’s right there with anybody in the league.”

Co-starring with Lindor as the Mets (68-62) stayed 2 1⁄2 games behind Atlanta for the last NL wild-card spot: lefthander David Peterson, who allowed a lone run in 7 1⁄3 innings. That lowered his ERA to 2.85, the best of any Mets starting pitcher.

Peterson was effective and efficient throughout, aided by a bunch of line drives at Mets defenders plus standout plays from Lindor and leftfielder Jesse Winker. The latter robbed Jackson Merrill of an extra-base hit with a diving catch in the second.

“That was a big one. Fun to watch,” Peterson said. “It’s everybody on defense. They all do a great job. So to see him fully lay out for that one and catch it was special.”

Peterson didn’t give up a hit until the fourth (Xander Bogaerts’ single) and didn’t give up a run until the fifth (on Luis Arraez’s groundout). San Diego (73-58) loaded the bases with one out in that inning but scratched across only the one run.

The Mets scored plenty against King, who deserved a better fate than five innings and five runs (one earned).

Alonso was credited with an RBI double in the first after his weak broken-bat ground ball bounced off the third-base bag and past Manny Machado.

The unearned runs all came on Lindor’s grand slam. Opening the door for that sequence: Machado dropped a soft line drive directly at him. Instead of an inning-ending out, the Mets had a two-out rally.

“Everybody in the dugout was highly into the game, into the moment,” Lindor said. “Everybody was just like all right, here we go, let’s go, let’s go, let’s make something happen.”

By Tim Healey

timothy.healey@newsday.com@timbhealey

Tim Healey is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. Born on Long Island and raised in Connecticut, Tim has previously worked for the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Boston Globe and MLB.com. He is also the author of “Hometown Hardball,” a book about minor league baseball in the northeast.