It’s safe to say that things could be going better for the New York Mets.

After jumping out to the lead in the NL East to start the year, they have since been surpassed by the surging Philadelphia Phillies. They had lost six of eight games over a recent stretch, before erasing those bad vibes with some wins over the Dodgers and White Sox. There have been questions about the hustle of Juan Soto, who is earning 765 million reasons to hustle over the next 15 years.

Mets’ mania reached its height at some point last week during the team’s dropped series against the crosstown rival New York Yankees. The vibes were, undeniably, bad, as the Mets hit a dismal .160 (4-for-25) with runners in scoring position, putting up just seven runs across three games against the Yankees.

But third baseman Mark Vientos is not worried about the struggles. Asked about the team’s RISP woes after their 9–4 loss to the White Sox on Wednesday, Vientos spoke with confidence.

"The way I look at it is, if this is us struggling, and we're winning games, imagine when we're not,” Vientos said. “I don't think the whole season is going to be like this."

Vientos comments came after another rough day for the Mets when it came to optimizing their opportunities with men on base, with the team hitting 2-for-12 in RISP situations.

But it’s likely that Vientos's perspective is the right one. The baseball regular season is a marathon, and every team in the majors will face its ups and downs over the summer swing.

Given the Mets are 4–1 over their past five games, and they sit just two games back in a divisional race against the team with the best record in the NL, things are pretty okay if this is what “struggling” looks like.

Still, if the Mets are going to reach the heights expected of them this season, they’re going to have to put it all together at one point. Scraping your way to wins is one thing, but this Mets team was built to dominate.


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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Mark Vientos Had an Optimistic Outlook on Mets' Recent Struggles.

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