Mets’ Jeff McNeil busting out after slow start to season

Big leagues

By Jared Schwartz

This is the Jeff McNeil the Mets were hoping for.

The McNeil the Mets need.

And the McNeil demands of himself.

He produced his second consecutive multi-hit game of the season, going 3 for 4 with an RBI in the Mets’ 6-1 victory over the Royals on Friday night at Citi Field in the series opener between the clubs.

It was his best performance of the year, and followed his previous best performance, when he went 2-for-3 at the plate with two walks and three RBIs in the Mets’ 16-4 rout of the Braves in the last game of the series on Thursday.

The two games mark the first multi-hit games of the season for McNeil, and he is now on a five-game hitting streak.

He started the season 2-for-22 at the plate, good for a brutal .091 batting average, with just one RBI and two walks in the team’s first seven games.

“It feels good. Every time I take a lot of hits, I’m in a good place,” McNeil told The Post. “I made some mechanical adjustments that put me in a much better place to hit. I feel like I see the ball better. I’m better handling the ball, everything fits.”

What were those adjustments?

“I’m just in a better place.” [stance in his] lower half [of his body], get my hands back and make sure they stay back instead of dripping forward,” McNeil said. “They were very small, but I have seen a big difference.”

McNeil gave the Mets a lead they never relinquished, lining to left field for an RBI single, scoring Brett Baty to put the Mets up 2-1.

“Not long ago he won a batting championship,” manager Carlos Mendoza said of McNeil. “…There will be times when you will go through ups and downs, more times [up] that below. These guys will make it. We’re looking at McNeil now in the last two games. “It’s good to see.”

All three of McNeil’s hits Friday night were singles.

Two of them went the opposite way to left field, while the other went to center field. In particular, he didn’t take out any of them.

It’s a testament to McNeil keeping his hands back, as he said has been a point of emphasis.

When that goes wrong, he often throws the ball away which makes him a good contact hitter who can use the entire field.

Entering Friday, McNeil had pulled the ball on 43.8 percent of the balls he put in play this year, according to FanGraphs.

That would be the second highest score of his career.

But he seems to be getting back to what he does best.

“That’s what he is, he’s a line-drive hitter,” Mendoza said. “And he will go the other way. “We’ve seen it throughout the lineup.”