Former Southern Miss right-handed pitcher Tyler Stuart reminisces on last years MLB draft and provides insight for players waiting on this year’s call

Earlier tonight, dreams came true for 70 talented athletes who heard their names called in the first two rounds of the 2023 MLB draft, but that also means hundreds of other athletes are patiently waiting to see if they’ll get a call.

Someone who knows that feeling all too well is Southern Miss alum Tyler Stuart, who was drafted to the Mets in the sixth round last year. Stuart’s testimony is proof that no matter when you get the call, what matters is how you answer it.

Right-handed pitcher Tyler Stuart is from the state of Illinois, but found his home on the diamond in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

Stuart redshirted his freshman year and then had Tommy John surgery the next year, but it says the time off taught him a lot about himself and the game.

“It was just a big part of my life where I just matured as a person and a player,” said Stuart. “Going through a hard injury, having covid all through it all at that same time was just a weird phase and I think just kind of sitting back and understanding the game at a better level really helped me.”

Once he came back from playing summer ball in the cape, Stuart says things started to click when now head coach Christian Ostrander began working his magic.

“We just kind of looked at some stuff with our Rapsodo numbers and I was throwing a four seam at the time and he switched me over to a two seam, and that just kind of allowed me to kind of change my game I’d say,” said Stuart. “He really helped me there on the mental side of things. He was phenomenal there and he honestly just changed me as a pitcher from like the metal side of things to where instead of kind of hoping for something to happen, he’d always say to expect things to happen and I think that was one of my biggest takeaways in my time with him.”

Having expectations on the rubber completely changed Stuart’s mindset when delivering to the plate, but he had no idea what to expect when it came to the 2022 MLB draft.

“You really don’t know if you’re going to get drafted,” said Stuart. “If you do know you’re going to get drafted, you don’t know round, you don’t know who. It’s kind of a weird feeling. I think my biggest piece of advice is just knowing it’s all going to work out like it’s supposed to. I mean, I never knew that I’d get drafted in the sixth round, I never knew I’d get drafted by the Mets. I had no idea, but you know I’m sitting here a year later and it worked out and there’s really no reason to stress about stuff like that. It’s always going to work out in the end.”

To say it worked out for Stuart in the end is an understatement.

703 minor league pitchers have thrown at least 40 innings this year, and Stuart is currently leading all of them with a 1.55 ERA..

He also hasn’t allowed more than two runs in his f14 starts for the Brooklyn Cyclones, the Triple-A affiliate of the Mets.

“I think the Mets were an overall great fit for me,” said Stuart. “I think that just the way they’ve used me and the ability to make stuff better and make me feel like, ‘yeah there’s work to do,’ but at the same time you do have really great abilities to do stuff. In the weight room whether it’s in the performance center side of things there or if it’s on the field making pitches in certain counts I feel like they’ve just done a really good job installing confidence in me.”

Here’s to hoping more great athletes like Tyler find their confidence in the 2023 MLB draft.