McNeil vs Lindor vs Soto

[G-Fafif]

Mike Puma reports Lindor and McNeil got into it after a loss in Philly in June, and that Lindor and Soto didn’t much warm to each other in the course of the year. Post subscription required for the whole thing, but that’s basically the crux.

[metirish]

Lindor likes fashion, Soto is all business apparently

[Gwreck]

In June. And the Post is printing it now, based solely on anonymous sources.

Exceptionally weak, even for that paper.

[Edgy MD]

I wouldn't bank on it, but I wouldn't doubt it either.

Anonymous sources appear at the end of a season. In the case of Ottavino, real ones do also.

Also notable that it comes shortly after a report that Lindor has been discussed as a trade candidate.

[metsmarathon]

Brown guys bad. White guy good.

Ugh, We still doin’ this narrative?

[G-Fafif]

Nice Soto-centric counterpoint from Deesha Thosar, from just after the season.

 

Throughout the season, Marte encouraged younger players to go up to Soto and pick his brain. He believed they may have been intimidated by Soto or scared to talk to him. Other times, Marte pulled Soto in front of the camera in the dugout after he hit a home run, a team tradition that dated back to last season’s OMG Mets. To bond with each other and disconnect from work, Soto, Marte, and Mauricio played dominoes and video games in hotel rooms during road trips.

Sometimes, Marte said, he would hit Soto on the head, or punch him in the arm. It was his way of making sure Soto felt light and comfortable with his new team.

"Some players are different. Nothing we can do with that," Marte said. "But something I can do is talk to him, (tell him to) come close to us. Jog with us. Bring more energy or emotion. I tell him, ‘I want to see you smiling more. It's something that, maybe you feel pressure. But it's something you can take away by talking to us, laughing with us. I want to see that. But, no rush, no rush. When you feel like you can do it, you do it.’

Soto appreciated Marte taking him under his wing this season.

"He helped me big time in the transition to the Mets," Soto said. "He's the guy who I'm talking to every day, teaching me, and showing me the Mets way."

Lindor credited Soto for being able to filter out any distractions in his first year with the Mets. And Soto’s narrow focus seemed to help the slugger record a career-best 43 home runs and 38 stolen bases this year.

 

https://www.foxsports.com/stories/mlb/how-juan-soto-impacted-teams-chemistry-his-first-season-mets

[Bob Alpacadaca]

The thing with Lindor and McNeill, in wondering if that's unusual. Would we see teammates getting frustrated with each other after bad plays in most clubhouses?

[Edgy MD]

Brown guys bad. White guy good.

Ugh, We still doin’ this narrative?

 

I am paywalled out of the Post article. Is it really framed that way?

[metsmarathon]

I’m also paywalled, but based on the snippets I e read, yeah, that’s what it smacks of.

Basically it feels to me like this is a hit piece on the brown guy who the popular white guy they just traded away apparently had some beef about.

[smg58]

Lindor and McNeil once had a very public beef and the team won 101 games the following season. Perhaps they should fight more.

On a scale of 1 to 10 on the Worry Meter, this presently ranks as a 0.

[Edgy MD]

I understood the two non-white guys — Lindor and Soto — to be somewhat pitted against each other in this telling.

That tracks with the seeming resistance of Soto through the year toward Lindor-as-captain talk, as he argued for the primacy of Starling Marte among Met clubhouse leaders.

I do not rank it as a zero — as much as this may be about filling offseason column inches — as these tend to be problems teams try to solve, for better or worse, and the lamentable trading of Nimmo and the possible trading of Lindor can partially be viewed through the lens of the team trying to put clubhouse rivalries to bed.