After a chaotic five days in which Zack Short was designated for assignment by the New York Mets and traded to the Red Sox in exchange for cash, the infielder was thrilled with the outcome.

“This is the first time I’ve been designated during the season,” he said before his debut on Thursday. “It’s not fun, obviously, but I’m really excited to be here and I think it worked out the best-case scenario.”

Though Short admitted that landing with another organization “Took a little bit longer than I hoped and expected,” he said he was “ecstatic, truly,” when it turned out to be the Red Sox.

The Kingston, NY native has several ties to the Boston area. He played college ball at Connecticut’s Sacred Heart, where his athletic director was 2012 Red Sox manager Bobby Valentine. He was also on the Brockton Rox of the Futures Collegiate Baseball League in 2014, and the Chatham Anglers in the Cape Cod Baseball League in 2015.

“Staying close to home – I had the chance to play close to home in New York for a month or so, and that was pretty special – to do it almost to the second-closest team outside of the Yankees, this is, it means a lot to have an opportunity to be here,” the Kingston, NY native explained. “It’s a great young team who’s been playing really well right now, and hopefully I can just come in here and step in here and help the team win.”

Short is the third new infielder to make his Sox debut in this series. Garrett Cooper’s first Red Sox game was Tuesday’s series opener. The former Miami Marlins top prospect started at first base and made some solid outs before getting hit by a pitch in the bottom of the fifth. He returned to the lineup as the designated hitter on Thursday.

Dom Smith debuted on Wednesday, hours after his deal became official. Another former Met, he went 1-for-3 with an RBI, helping the Sox officially win the three-game series.

It’s not often a team has a new infielder debut in three consecutive games, but such is life when the injuries keep coming. Trevor Story is out for the year following shoulder surgery, Triston Casas is on the 60-day injured list with a rib cartilage injury, and Masataka Yoshida is on the 10-day with a thumb strain.

This week, the Red Sox designated utilityman Pablo Reyes for assignment and optioned Enmanuel Valdez to Triple-A. The latter wasn’t an easy decision, Alex Cora explained.

“It’s a tough one, because we asked (Valdez) to do what he did,” the manager said. “It was night-and-day defensively. He did an amazing job.

“Offensively, he hit the ball hard in the air. He’s a good at-bat. Take the numbers away, you see the at-bat, probably thought that he was hitting .280 with a .850 OPS… That wasn’t the case, but he did well.”

The roster moves will keep coming rapid-fire, as Vaughn Grissom is expected to be added to the active roster in Minnesota, and Nick Pivetta and Brayan Bello are on rehab assignments.

“It’s one of those tough ones,” Cora said of optioning Valdez. “And it’s going to get tougher because we have more talent than in the past.”

All things considered, it’s a good problem to have.