SAN ANTONIO — There are holes that need to be filled through free agency and the Mets are more of a win-now team than a year ago, but a basic tenet remains in place for the front office.
Develop young talent.
It’s a point president of baseball operations David Stearns reaffirmed Tuesday at the GM meetings when discussing Brett Baty, Ronny Mauricio and Luisangel Acuña, in particular, and their futures with the Mets.
“Regardless of what offseason we’re going to have, regardless of where we are from an organization perspective, we have to allow young players to play,” Stearns said. “This is going to be true every single year for us and we were able to see that this year with Mark [Vientos] coming up and really establishing himself and if we allow ourselves to have those opportunities in future years as well we’re going to get rewarded for it.”
Vientos began last spring in competition for the third base job and was sent to Triple-A Syracuse to begin the season.
He got his shot in mid-May and excelled, with a breakout season that included 27 homers and an .837 OPS.
Now it’s Baty (who began last season as the starting third baseman) in the mix for another opportunity.
The 24-year-old saw action at second base last season for Syracuse and Stearns won’t rule out the possibility of giving him a chance in the outfield.
“We learned a lot about Brett this year,” Stearns said. “We learned that he’s able to take a punch and go down and keep working and I think we also learned that he’s able to play multiple positions, and he picked up second base pretty quickly to the point we were considering adding him to a postseason roster with the potential of playing some second base. That is pretty significant. And his ability to do that leads me to believe that if we ask him to be able to play additional positions.”
Acuña got an opportunity with the Mets late in the season with Francisco Lindor battling lower back discomfort and brought energy to the lineup and infield.
The 22-year-old rookie posted a .966 OPS in 14 games and perhaps changed perceptions about him in the organization after an underwhelming season offensively with Syracuse.
“Any time you are able to make an impression at the major league level it’s a good thing,” Stearns said. “And he obviously performed at a very important time of the season for us. We also understand it was a couple of weeks and I think we have a significant amount of performance and history on all of those guys to fall back on.”
Mauricio, 23, missed last season rehabbing from surgery to repair a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee.
Mauricio later underwent additional surgery to remove scar tissue.
Stearns in late October said there was concern Mauricio hadn’t resumed baseball activity.
On Tuesday, Stearns said the infielder was coming off a “good week” of rehab and the expectation is he will be ready for spring training.
As it stands, the second base job belongs to Jeff McNeil — the team still could look to re-sign Jose Iglesias — but Baty, Acuña and Mauricio could figure into the mix in some capacity.
“If all of them are healthy and playing well it’s a great conundrum to have,” Stearns said. “I like having multiple young players who have the type of talent those guys have, who can all play multiple positions. If that’s where we are come spring training, that is a very enviable position to be in.”
