David Stearns touts Brett Batys versatility with Mets committed to developing young players

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 ...