MLB

With Stars gone, it’s time for the Mets to address second-half issues

MOVING ON: Fresh off Tuesday’s All-Star Game at Citi Field, the Mets now have to address a handful of issues in the second half of the season starting tonight, writes The Post’s Ken Davidoff, including the future of manager Terry Collins (inset top right) and first baseman Ike Davis (inset bottom right). (N.Y. Post: Charles Wenzelberg; UPI; Anthony J. Causi)

How fitting that, after seeing Citi Field more electric than it has ever been, we get some real tension in Flushing.

We just saw the sizzle with the All-Star Game. Now come the stakes for the Mets.

If they can’t build on their past month, can’t finally wrap up a season with some positive momentum, then the Mets’ rebuilding effort will take a considerable hit. For multiple reasons both on and off the field, they desperately need a strong second half.

“I think that we’ve progressively gotten better as the year has gone on,” David Wright said Tuesday, his clubhouse filled with National League All-Stars. “I’m excited about that. That’s what we need to continue to do, is improve.”

The last time the Mets (41-50) got better from pre-All-Star-break to post-break was 2008, and even that concluded in disastrous fashion, as the team fell from atop the NL East to, in Game 162, out of the playoffs altogether — the second consecutive such collapse, you’ll recall. The first two years of the Sandy Alderson/Terry Collins administration began encouragingly and ended appallingly.

It starts at home, where the Mets play host to the Phillies tonight and where they are a lousy 17-27 this season, as opposed to 24-23 on the road.

“Everybody asks me that,” Terry Collins said when asked by The Post about the home woes. “Number one, I think in our park, it’s a tough place to hit. Everybody knows that. Power is a big thing with us. It’s hard to hit homers here. One of the things that I think Eric Young is going to bring to us is that speed in the outfield. We’re catching baseballs, and that’s going to make a big difference here. Our outfield has really played well.”

The mention of Young speaks to a larger hope, one Alderson addressed this past week in an interview with WFAN: The home-road disparity largely aligns with the Mets’ reshaped roster and their 17-11 run into the break. Of those 28 games, 20 came on the road, during which the Mets went 13-7; they went 4-4 in their eight home games. So an optimist would contend the new look and better results will simply transport back here.

It’s essential that happens because of the vast trust deficit that still exists between the Mets’ fans and the team’s ownership. The club needs to sell the perception it’s on the verge of a surge, and home victories must be a part of that sales pitch.

Next on the to-do list is Ike Davis. “One of the biggest keys, we’ve got to get Ike going,” Collins said. “If we do, if he has a second half like he did last year, I’ll tell you, we’re going to win some baseball games.”

The Mets would be out of their minds to bring Davis into next year and count on him as their everyday first baseman. So the rest of this season has to be about building his trade value. And if he comes out of the gate looking as shaky as he has since coming up from the minor leagues, then the Mets should consider dealing him by the July 31 non-waivers trading deadline in one of those “fresh start” exchanges. A comparable would be last year’s swap of Toronto’s Travis Snider for Pittsburgh’s Brad Lincoln.

The final big box to check is who will be managing this team in 2014 and beyond. The Mets’ leadership likes Collins and wants him to succeed. The idea of Wally Backman coming up from Triple-A Las Vegas, this year or next year, appears more myth than reality. It’s on Collins to avoid the second-half nosedives of his first two years here — the first of which, to be fair, resulted largely from the 2011 trades of Carlos Beltran (to San Francisco) and Francisco Rodriguez (to Milwaukee) — and cross the finish line with everyone feeling positive about the direction.

There isn’t a wins target he has to reach, and he also has to manage the innings counts of Matt Harvey and Zack Wheeler, both of whom figure to skip some starts along the way. It just has to pass the smell test — not only for the fans, but also for prospective free agents whom the Mets could pursue this winter.

“I come in here every day, and the only thing I worry about is to make sure these guys are ready to play,” Collins said. “… At the end of the year, whatever it is, it’s going to be. I don’t worry about it.”

That should be his approach. Yet he gets it. Everyone on the Mets gets it. Starting tonight, it’s time to ramp up this reclamation project.