A first-round pick of the Baltimore Orioles in 2015, DJ Stewart’s major league career has been a bit of a roller coaster ride. Since making his debut in 2018, the outfielder played in just 195 games over the course of his first five pro seasons.
After signing with the Mets this past February, Stewart had a strong spring in Port St. Lucie, slashing .370/.528/.667, but he still started the year in the minors.
And while Wednesday’s game was his 25th of the season for the Mets, it was also his coming out party in a way, as he homered twice and put his stamp on the 8-3 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates.
After homering as a pinch-hitter in Tuesday’s loss, Stewart’s power surge continued on Wednesday, as he went deep twice, recording the third multi-home run game of his career.
“Guys coming through being first-round picks and all these great expectations and they have some periods where they may not get to what everybody hopes they get to, and then sometimes you get a good player after that’s over,” said Buck Showalter, who was in Baltimore when Stewart was selected in the first round, “… the world’s full of players who really care about figuring things out a little bit. Hopefully we’re seeing some of that with him.”
Stewart told SNY’s Steve Gelbs after the game that he’s been dealing with a “little bit of a wrist thing” that has limited the number of swings he’s been able to take. But now that he’s feeling healthy again, Stewart has been putting a charge into the ball.
“I’ve been having a little injury bug bothering me a little bit, but I’m finally getting a little bit healthy and being able to adjust in there,” Stewart said. “Just getting good pitches and not missing them, putting good swings on them.
He added: “Happy to be healthy and go out there and help the team win.”
Stewart drove in three runs at the dish, but he also made a couple of fine plays in the outfield, including a catch up against the wall and a perfect throw to the cutoff man to nab a runner at the plate to end the top of the fifth. After Jack Suwinski pulled a double into the corner, Stewart hustled over and hit Jeff McNeil, who in turn threw a strike to Omar Narvaez to gun down Andrew McCutchen and maintain a 4-2 lead for the home team.
“I don’t know what series it was, but I missed the first man in the one series and Buck let me know about it,” Stewart said with a smile.
“Just making sure I fixed that today.”
