How upstart Mark Vientos added ‘personal’ chapter to Mets’ magical story

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Rowan Kavner

MLB Writer

LOS ANGELES — After the Dodgers intentionally walked Francisco Lindor in the second inning Monday afternoon, the 24-year-old hitting behind the Mets‘ MVP candidate looked perplexed. Mark Vientos raised his sunglasses and tipped his head to the side, almost in disbelief that they wanted to pitch to him.

“I took it personal,” Vientos said after launching the second grand slam of the Mets’ postseason in a 7-3 win that evened the National League Championship Series at one game apiece.

If the Dodgers didn’t know much earlier this year about the Mets third baseman, who was 10 games into his 2024 season the last time these teams faced off in the regular season, they do now.

“I mean, I want to be up there during that at-bat,” Vientos continued. “I want them to walk Lindor in that situation, put me up there.”

Vientos, now a fixture hitting near the top of the Mets’ lineup, wasn’t even the likeliest 24-year-old to earn his team’s job at the hot corner this year. The 2017 second-round pick’s season began at Syracuse, and he sported a .610 OPS over parts of two big-league seasons entering this year.

But this version of Vientos, who made the Dodgers pay for the free pass, is not like previous iterations.

“My man’s got a lot of confidence in himself,” Sean Manaea said. “I love that.”

Why wouldn’t he?

On Monday, Vientos’ blast gifted the Mets starter an early 6-0 lead that provided plenty of cushion during his five innings of work.

“Ever since he got here,” Manaea continued, “he’s been doing some crazy things.”

When the season began, Brett Baty was the Mets’ starting third baseman. But the former top prospect’s struggles out of the gate opened a door, and Vientos, who was recalled on May 15, stepped through with a giant leap. By the time Baty was optioned on May 31, it was clear the full-time third-base job belonged to Vientos, who never looked back.

While his name might not hold the same weight or prestige as perennial third base sensations like Manny Machado or Alex Bregman, Vientos finished the season with a higher wRC+ than both of them. In fact, among MLB third basemen with at least 400 plate appearances this season, the only ones with a higher OPS than Vientos were José Ramírez and Rafael Devers.

“The power is real,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said.

It is not a coincidence that his ascension coincided with his team’s.

From Vientos’ call-up through the end of the year, New York was one of three teams to compile 70 wins. His steady rise both in production and the Mets’ lineup — he went from hitting in the bottom half of the order in June to behind Lindor in September — helped turn around a team that was 11 games under .500 in early June.

In regular-season games Vientos started this year, the Mets were 61-44. In games he didn’t, they were 28-29.

“He’s embracing every opportunity and enjoying the ride,” Lindor said. “There’s one thing that Mark doesn’t lack, that’s confidence.”

Lindor is the only Mets player worth more WAR than Vientos. They both had exactly 26 home runs from the time Vientos was promoted in mid-May through the end of the year.

Now, they’ve both come up huge through the team’s magical October run.

For Lindor, there was the game-winning ninth-inning homer he launched against the rival Braves to get them into the playoffs and the go-ahead grand slam in Philadelphia that would send the Mets through the NLDS to face the Dodgers.

When the Mets seemed to forget who they were in Game 1 at Dodger Stadium, getting blanked for the first time this postseason and looking uncompetitive in the process, Lindor got them back on business hours in Monday’s matinee with a leadoff home run that ended the Dodgers’ postseason record-tying streak of consecutive scoreless innings at 33.

So, you can’t blame them for giving Lindor a free base with two on, two out and a bullpen game threatening to get out of hand quickly.

Unless, of course, you’re Vientos.

“They would rather take a chance on me than him,” Vientos said. “But I use it as motivation. I’m like, ‘All right, you want me up, I’m going to show you.'”

In a postseason field filled with decorated stars, that self-belief is helping a less-heralded Met stand out.

In the Mets’ first game of the playoffs, it was Vientos’ single off Aaron Ashby in the fifth inning that broke a tie and ended up being the deciding hit.

In their first game of the NLDS, Vientos’ game-tying single in the eighth inning sparked a five-run frame in a comeback win.

In Game 2 of the NLDS, Vientos became the third-youngest player to record 10 total bases in a playoff game.

On Monday, he became the youngest player to hit a grand slam in LCS history. Vientos would add a single in his next at-bat for his sixth multi-hit game in nine postseason appearances.

He now leads all players this October in hits and RBIs.

“He’s very confident,” Lindor repeated. “He’s a player who believes in himself. He doesn’t back down.”

Despite the self-assuredness and swagger, Vientos has still demonstrated preternatural poise to consistently deliver when presented opportunities.

On his grand slam, Vientos said he wasn’t thinking about going deep. But when Landon Knack lofted a four-seamer right down the middle on the ninth pitch of the at-bat?

“Yeah,” Vientos said, “I wasn’t going to miss it.”

As he has done to opponents so often this month, and throughout a 2024 season that has solidified his place as the third baseman of the future in New York, Vientos delivered.

While his 391-foot drive would have been a flyout at Citi Field and 23 other major-league ballparks, all that mattered was at Dodger Stadium, it kept going, and going and going … until it dropped over the wall in right-center field, lifting a Mets team that had found its form again and dismantling the Dodgers’ hopes early in a bullpen game.

“You didn’t see a big swing,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said. “It was, let me put it in play, let me stay in the big part of the ballpark, and he was able to drive that one. You see the next at-bat against a lefty, just going the other way with ease and just shoot the ball the other way. That’s a sign of not only a good hitter but someone that is mature and is under control.”

The Mets have demonstrated all year they’re not going to fold.

In Game 2, after their worst loss of the postseason, they punched back behind their MVP candidate and the 24-year-old behind him who’s playing like one.

“That’s who he is,” Lindor said. “I’m glad he took it personal. He’s got to continue to climb.”

Rowan Kavner is an MLB writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the L.A. Dodgers, LA Clippers and Dallas Cowboys. An LSU grad, Rowan was born in California, grew up in Texas, then moved back to the West Coast in 2014. Follow him on Twitter at @RowanKavner.

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