But Sharknado director Anthony C. Ferrante was running out of time to make his gruesome, twisted, MLB-infused vision a reality.

“I knew that if we were going to do New York, we were going to do baseball,” Ferrante told Sporting News. “And you can’t do ‘Sharknado’ without a ballpark.”

If you were one of the 3.9 million viewers who tuned in for Wednesday night’s “Sharknado 2: The Second One” on Syfy, you already know that Ferrante got his ballpark. He got a character to bash a hammerhead shark into the Citi Field scoreboard. He even got the Mets’ Home Run Apple involved.

All of that, he says, almost never happened.

“We kept saying that ‘MLB won’t let us shoot in their field,’ " Ferrante said. “One of our producers kept hounding them, and in the 11th hour, we got Citi Field.”

What they got was one day to shoot — and it was one heck of a day.

There was snow. There was rain. There was sun.

And yeah, there also was one gnarly Sharknado.

“When you see all the stuff we did in the film, (the Mets) talked to us — ‘what do you want to do?’ — they just made it easy,” Ferrante said. “They rolled out the red carpet for us.”

Because of the original film’s popularity among sports fans, the director said he “wanted to pay tribute to the sports community that so whole-heartedly embraced” the low-budget flick. 

“The first time around, I was floored that the sports community loved us,” Ferrante said. “It’s a silly concept that everyone sort of came aboard.

“It doesn’t make sense, but with Sharknado, it doesn’t need to make sense. It just happens and you accept it.”

“THE NEXT GREAT BASEBALL SONG”

Quick, name three baseball-themed songs.

Got ’em yet? No?

“You can’t do it,” Sharknado director Anthony C. Ferrante told me Friday afternoon. “And I couldn’t do it either.”

Buying rights for the two everyone can name — " Take Me Out To The Ballpark " and " Centerfield " — were “definitely cost prohibitive” for Ferrante’s second Syfy-channel film centered on those flying, carnivorous fish. This one was going to have key scenes at Citi Field, home of the New York Mets, and it needed musical accompaniment. 

But when you’re building the most inexplicable phenomenon in made-for-TV movie history, you don’t let a few budgetary issues get in the way.

“When I started making my movies, Robbie Rist, who’s a good friend of mine, said ‘come on over to my studio,’ " Ferrante said. “My first movie we needed some blues songs, and they sounded great in the film. That became a thing.

“So (for Sharknado 2), we said we have to write a great baseball song, no matter if anyone hears it or not.”

The result: “One Swing Away (Batter Up!)” with Ferrante — yeah, the director for Sharknado — on lead vocals.

The song plays as a devastating sharknado descends on the Mets’ ballpark — which a stunning 3.9 million viewers watched happen Wednesday night.

“It’s actually pretty incredible,” Ferrante said. “You don’t get lightning in a bottle twice. Who would have figured?”

The duo’s album, appropriately named “Great White Skies,” is on sale now at the iTunes store.

SHAQNADO

Sharknado 3 is coming, and if the director of the first two installments has his way, those flying man-eaters are in for a big surprise — 7-feet, 325 pounds, to be exact.

“I’ve always liked Shaq,” Anthony C. Ferrante told Sporting News. “I would love to see him take on a shark and see if he could win. You want someone that’s formidable, and Shaq is a foe.”

The writer/director/musician of “Sharknado” and “Sharknado 2: The Second One” has embraced both the sports world and celebrity cameos in his popular made-for-TV Syfy movies. The next logical step, he said, is the sort of well-known character that even a sharknado should fear.

“I think, if I was a shark, I’d be afraid of him,” Ferrante said. “I’d think twice about flying into that boy.”

Oh, and Shaq? When you report to the set, bring your skates.

Ferrante, in an effort to “continue the sports legacy” of the Sharknado series, said he would entertain the idea of an NHL-themed disaster.

“I think we’d have to do hockey because of the ice,” he said. “We’ve done the stadium thing, and we’re good with that. What are the new things we can do? The ice gives you something different. 

“There are a lot of different sports we’ve been thinking about, though. I won’t tip my hand. I don’t want to get in trouble.”

According to Ferrante, there were discussions before the second Sharknado movie  about working with the NHL’s Sharks in San Jose. That changed when the New York Mets became an option, but the seed already was planted.

When an inexplicable third Sharknado strikes next year, don’t be surprised to see some shark-on-Sharks violence.

“I think a hockey team with big sticks would be the perfect thing to take down sharks,” Ferrante said.

That, and one of the biggest stars in NBA history.

The ball is in your court, Mr. O’Neal. Just please make sure your agent gets “Shaqnado” in the title.

Contributor: John Turner