The Mets called up A.J. Ewing and put the 21-year-old in center field and batting eighth Tuesday night for his major league debut. After 251 games in the minors, Ewing was finally in the lineup that had been waiting for him.
David Stearns said Ewing was there because “he is or else he wouldn’t have been in center field and hitting eighth Tuesday night for his MLB debut,” a blunt nod to how quickly the club wanted to use him. The move came after Ewing spent 12 games at Triple-A over the past two weeks, a short stop before the leap to the majors.
That jump matters because the Mets had been listless and lifeless, with a season described as a disaster movie so far. Ewing’s call-up did not fix everything by itself, but it did give the club something it had been missing: a young player who had been capable of getting on base and then creating havoc once there.
For Ewing, the debut was the result of a long climb rather than a sudden promotion. He had worked through 251 minor league games before getting the call, and the Mets chose to send him straight into the middle of a game plan that put him in center field right away. That kind of arrival says as much about the state of the roster as it does about the player.
The tension around the move is obvious. Ewing’s speed and on-base skills made him a useful answer, but he was also being asked to help a team that had already burned through a grim stretch. The debut was a reward for patience and performance in the minors, yet it also doubled as a sign that the Mets were ready to try something different in a season that had gone badly enough to force a reset.
What happens next will come down to whether Ewing can turn that first night into something lasting. The Mets did not bring him up to watch; they brought him up to play, and to test whether one 21-year-old can help change the feel of a team that had been searching for life.
