Mets New Top Prospect From Weaver Deal Is Also A Diehard Fan

It took a lot to get the New York Mets to trade Luke Weaver, but the Mets were enticed by the Pittsburgh Pirates’ decision to make shortstop prospect Sammy Stafura available. It was a rare opportunity to get a top prospect the Mets have been eyeing for some time, and so they jumped on it. 

Stafura was on the team bus of the Pirates’ minor league affiliate in Greensboro in North Carlina heading from Greensboro to Rome when the deal went down. He saw what was happening on his phone, of coruse, and he got excited when he saw that Weaver was being sent to the Pittsburgh Pirates. 

“I was like, 'Oh wow. I feel like this is me,’” Stafura told MLB.com late Monday night in a piece written by Aiden Stepansky of MLB.com. “There's been links to the Mets for the past few days, so I was pretty confident that it was gonna be me. And then I saw my name.”

The Mets were excited as well, and for good reason. According to GM David Stearns, Stafura’s defenise “jumps off the page” and creates a high ceiling, especially when aedd in his ability to hit for power. 

For Stafura, there’s a bonus here. He grew up in Westchester County as a diehard Mets fan, with his favorites players being the likes of David Wright, Jose Reyes and Ruben Tejada. That should help him deal with the rigors of the New York market, provided he can handle the pressure of being hometown hero when he does make it to Citi Field. 

“It's honestly super special,” Stafura said. “This is a dream come true. To be in this situation is surreal.”

Stafura has also been getting antsy, as he’s been sitting out multiple games in anticipating being moved at the deadline, and he’s also been dealing with minor hamstring cramping lately. He mentioned getting hundreds of texts when the trade happened, and at a certain point it became impossible to ignore what was happening. 

“The last couple weeks have been a little bit hectic,” Stafura said. “I'm just playing baseball, but you also got this on your mind because you're like, ‘This could happen any moment.’ I was tweaking out all day because I knew something was gonna happen. I just had that feeling.”

On the field, Stafura has put up some impressive numbers. He was hitting .301 with a 1.021 OPS in High-A Greensboro this season and in July alone, he put on a hitting clinic with 14 homers in 18 games. According to Stepansky, the Mets are sending the Pirates $8,123,529 to cover a large chunk of Weaver’s contract for both this season and next. 

Stafura has been dealing with injuries like the hamstring and a partial tear in his UCL earlier in the season, but he recently went on what he calls a “bender” with the home run tear. 

“Mentally, I’m believing that I'm the best player on the field and acting like that every single day,” Stafura said. “I think that's been one of the biggest parts this year, at least, is just believing that I am the person I am, and I've started acting like that the past month, and it's been showing pretty well.”