{"id":653600,"date":"2026-03-31T01:37:34","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T01:37:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/653600\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T01:37:34","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T01:37:34","slug":"laura-albanese-bo-bichette-struggling-early-give-the-new-guy-a-break","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/653600\/","title":{"rendered":"Laura Albanese: Bo Bichette struggling early? Give the new guy a break!"},"content":{"rendered":"

ST. LOUIS, Mo. \u2014 The swing went right through strike three and the boos followed,\u00a0a disgusted acknowledgment of a limp at-bat against a weaker opponent. The sentiment among fans at Citi Field was clear: The Mets paid that much for this?<\/p>\n

The date was May 28, 2025, and Juan Soto, who had gone 0-for-6 in his previous two games against a ghastly White Sox team, had struck out against a reliever who came into that\u00a0day with a 5.16 ERA. It was\u00a0part of what turned out to be an 0-for-4 day.<\/p>\n

By now, you know how that turned out. Despite the Mets\u2019 various failures last year, Soto bounced back from his \u201cslow\u201d start to have one of his best seasons in a Hall of Fame-track career. He came in third in MVP voting, was just two stolen bases shy of becoming just the seventh member of the 40-40 club, led the National League in homers and on-base percentage, and led all of baseball in walks.<\/p>\n

Yes, it took time, and from a human perspective, that makes sense. You can have generational talent, but there\u2019s intense pressure that comes with a $765 million contract, and from joining a new team. Even if it\u2019s just the one across town.<\/p>\n

Sounds familiar, doesn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n

Bo Bichette is not Juan Soto, but he\u2019s undoubtedly a talented player who\u2019s being compensated like one. Playing in a new city for the first time in his career, Bichette, 28, signed a three-year, $126 million contract<\/a> to come to Flushing. His $40 million signing bonus alone is more than what he made in his three-year deal with the Blue Jays.<\/p>\n

And by Sunday, that new city was booing him. This one came after a seventh-inning strikeout against the Pirates<\/a>,\u00a0his MLB-leading eighth of the season. This, from a guy who struck out just 14.5% of the time last year, which was in the 86th percentile in baseball.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

To which we say, let\u2019s learn from the lessons of yesteryear. And maybe, just maybe, Bichette should be cut a little slack.<\/p>\n

There were \u201cdefinitely\u201d takeaways from the Soto situation, manager Carlos Mendoza said Monday as the Mets got set to take on the Cardinals.<\/p>\n

The biggest one? \u201cHaving conversations with [Bichette]\u00a0and understanding that you\u2019re not the first one and you\u2019re not going to be the last one,\u201d Mendoza said. \u201cIt happens to the best players in the game and not only here with the Mets in New York or in big market teams. Everything is new for them \u2014 the contract, new team, new fan base. There\u2019s an adjustment period . . . He\u2019s a really good player and it\u2019s three games here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just three games. Remember that. And frankly, there\u2019s evidence Bichette can handle the guff. Mendoza Monday praised his third-baseman\u2019s professionalism,\u00a0i.e., taking it on the chin and his saying he deserved it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf anything, I think [the boos]\u00a0took too long\u201d to start up, Bichette said Sunday.<\/a> In a frank display of humanity he added: \u201cI didn\u2019t anticipate it, but I definitely felt like I wanted to have a moment, not only for my teammates but for the fans and everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

How long has he felt that way?<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the day I signed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

And there it is. We\u2019re so conditioned to think about baseball contracts like they\u2019re made of Monopoly money. These players are millionaires plenty of times over, and current salaries mean fans don\u2019t blink twice at numbers that look like they should be Powerball payouts. But athletes are people\u00a0and people have egos. They have expectations\u00a0and they feel pressure. Especially when it comes to doing something nearly as impossible as appearing “worth” the eye-watering money they\u2019re making.<\/p>\n

That means there\u2019s going to be an acclimation period as Bichette settles into a new life, and as he deals with the psychological aspect game. He\u2019s also adjusting to a new position, and no matter what anyone says, a shift like that takes up mental capital. It’s\u00a0capital that, in a past life, would be expended on offense.<\/p>\n

There is this, though: Early on, Bichette had some highly competitive at-bats, and there\u2019s no universe where a player known for striking out very little, and for hitting well with runners in scoring position, immediately stops doing both for no reason.<\/p>\n

Mendoza, for his part, is unconcerned.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe understands the stage,\u201d Mendoza said. \u201cWhen he signed up here, he knew right away what he was signing up for and he was like, \u2018I love it. I can\u2019t wait.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

He might not exactly be loving it yet, but give it time. And if you\u2019re feeling impatient, just remember: They booed Soto once, too.<\/p>\n

\"Laura<\/p>\n

Laura Albanese is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. She’s been covering MLB since 2014 after starting at Newsday as an intern seven years earlier.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ST. LOUIS, Mo. \u2014 The swing went right through strike three and the boos followed,\u00a0a disgusted acknowledgment of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":653601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2396],"tags":[5,101,4,1690,61,2548,4203],"class_list":{"0":"post-653600","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-mets","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mets","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-mets","13":"tag-newyork","14":"tag-newyorkmets"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116321233318847063","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=653600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/653601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=653600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=653600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=653600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}