The New York Mets called up former Troy Trojan TJ Rivera on Wednesday; he will make his Major League Baseball roster debut when the Mets host the Arizona Diamondbacks at 6:10 p.m. (CDT) at Citi Field.
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Rivera played in the first game of Tuesday’s doubleheader against Albuquerque and was absent for the second.
“Wally called me into his office, kind of tricked me a little bit”, Rivera said.
Not only is Rivera a wonderful example and role model to all the impoverished kids growing up in the Bronx, but he is a beacon of light to the blue-collared Bronx community that has certainly seen its fair share of struggles over the years.
Rivera said he landed in NY around 6:30 a.m. and met his wife and mom for a little while before getting some sleep.
A native of the Bronx, Rivera went undrafted out of Troy University, but the Mets signed him as an undrafted free agent in 2011 and he has steadily worked his way up the system, compiling a.323 average in the minors.
“When I wasn’t drafted, honestly, I was trying to instantly figure out, ‘What am I going to do with my life?”
“Once they signed me, I was going to have a chance just like everybody else, just like the guys that were drafted”, Rivera said.
However, Rivera said that going undrafted is not something he often thinks about.
Rivera credited his wife and the rest of his family with providing him support and helping him to stay in the right frame of mind.
“Yeah, you do, you do after the trade deadline and things like that”, he said.
Rivera said he found out about his promotion from Las Vegas manager Wally Backman. “And he was super excited”. Batting.349 over the course of 97 appearances for Triple-A Las Vegas thus far into the 2016 regular season, the up-and-coming infielder has also added 11 home runs and 80 RBI to coincide with his impressive.391 on-base percentage. Rivera went 15 for 29 from August 1-7 and was named the league’s player of the week. Manager Terry Collins suggested that Rivera would get a chance to prove himself in a lineup searching for production minus stars Yoenis Cespedes, David Wright and Lucas Duda.
The Mets are last in the majors in hitting and next-to-last in runs. He has primarily played third base but has played in other positions such as first base, second base and left field. We just tried to play him around and see where he could play and he swung the bat very well.
“I had heard a lot of minor league guys talking about, this guy can really hit”, Collins said. “I was interested to see his swing and see what his approach was. Not a lot of movement in his swing”.
“You start to wonder if this year is the year you are going to get the call”, Rivera said.
Now his chance is officially here.
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“But you try to put that behind you”, he said.
