PHILADELPHIA With an offense that has not hit for the majority of the still-early season, the Mets are leaning on their past and believing it will eventually become their present. Francisco Lindor owns a .194 batting average and .633 OPS. Pete Alonsos on-base percentage has sunk to .308. Jeff McNeil, the 2022 NL batting champion, holds a .230 average with one home run in his first 43 games. The Mets offense has been the largest cause of a slow start and arguably has been the largest surprise of their first seven weeks of the season. David Stearns looked over the bats on Thursday and said he trusts the years of performance rather than the seven weeks of mostly nonperformance. Explore More We have players with track records who have performed over the course of their careers, the president of baseball operations said before the over the Phillies at Citizens Bank Igor Chernyshov Jersey Park. The Mets are hitting a collective .232 and entered play having scored just 4.21 runs per game, the 13th worst in the majors. Stearns did not see a commonality among the various slow-starting hitters, though he did mention that the Mets schedule has been pretty tough thus far. David Stearns claims its only a matter of time until the Mets offense picks up. Getty Images The struggles , who is platooning with Brett Baty (who has not hit) at third base. The Mets decided to sacrifice some defensive ability and versatility for a bat they deemed they needed. In other seasons, perhaps the Mets could have allowed Baty to continue to get the majority of reps at third and learn through his struggles. Because of the offenses collective funk, that wasnt an option this season. Delivering insights on all things Amazins Sign up for Inside the Mets by Mike Puma, exclusively on Sports+ Thank you By clicking above you agree to the and . Enjoy this Post Sports+ exclusive newsletter! Lindor has been a notable underperformer, though the shortstops advanced metrics are encouraging. He is still hitting the ball hard. He entered with a .273 expected batting average, hinting at an inordinate amount of bad luck. I think similar to our team, there have been flashes that have been really, really solid and then times where he probably would expect himself to perform a little bit better, Stearns said of Lindor. But I fully expect hes going to have a Francisco Lindor type of year. Hes a really good player. I think especially over the last few weeks, month, hes taken very consistent at-bats. Sometimes hes found the holes and sometimes he hasnt. Francisco Lindor and Pete Alonso are off to slow starts in 2024. Getty Images Stearns spoke similarly of Alonso, whose bat has gotten going. He acknowledged, though, that McNeil who struggled for much of last season, too, when he finished with a .270 average and .711 OPS has not shown as much. Jeffs a good hitter who hasnt hit yet, Stearns said before McNeil went 0-for-4 with a walk. We really believe hes a good hitter. Hes working his tail off to get back to where he wants to be. And certainly were going to give him every opportunity we po sibly can to get going. If the Mets offense does not get going, they likely would approach the same cro sroads that Billy Eppler faced last year, when the . Francisco Lindor after making the last out in Tuesdays lo s. Robert Sabo for NY Post Owner Steve Cohen acknowledged that the Mets will have decisions to make at the deadline . Whatever the Mets strategy will be in a few months will be decided in a few months. Were not anywhere close to even having discu sions like that. Were in mid-May, Stearns said. Were focused every single day on trying to win baseball games. From a trade-deadline strategy discu sion, thats something that weve got months to figure out. Collin Graf Jersey