Mets Blogger Roundtable: Our Favorite David Wright Moments

This past week it was announced David Wright was going to be shut down for roughly two months before he can once again resume baseball activities.  It was once again a blow to Wright’s attempt to get back on the field.   As Mets fans and David Wright fans, this was a blow to the chances of seeing one of our favorite players on the field again. It is a cause to feel a bit melancholy.

However, it is also a reminder of all the great moments Wright had during his Mets career.  To that end, instead of lamenting all the problems which have befallen Wright, in the latest Mets Blogger Roundtable, we endeavor to highlight the greatness of David Wright by focusing on our favorite moments of his career:

Roger Cormier (Good Fundies & Fangraphs)

David Wright just found out he was about to play in his first World Series after 12 seasons of playing professional baseball. He probably wanted to (gently) hug each and every one of his teammates for helping him get to the promised land, but he’s David Wright, and Sam Ryan wanted thirty seconds of his time. So it was on television he first saw it: a Mets cap with the World Series logo on it. Thanks to his spinal stenosis, he probably worked incredibly hard just to get out of bed that morning, let alone to play that night. His smile was the most genuine smile in the history of smiles, Smile Hall of Fame first ballot stuff. We are told hard work pays off, that there is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, and the eyes of the nicest man in the world told the nicest man in the world the shocking discovery: sometimes it’s true.

Mark Healey (Gotham Baseball)

In a 2010 Gotham Baseball piece, Healey wrote why Wright is his favorite baseball player.  For him, it wasn’t just what Wright did on the field, but rather it was something Wright said.

Joe Maracic (Loud Egg)

My favorite David Wright memory was when he was first called up. Watching him and Jose Reyes play side by side was so great even Yankee fans were jealous of our young infield.

Remember the argument, who had the better infield? Ahh the good old days. The sky was the limit… then the injuries.

Greg Prince (Faith and Fear in Flushing)

On Friday night, August 26, 2005, David Wright came up with nobody on in the second inning at what was then SBC Park in San Francisco and homered off Kevin Correia to give the Mets a 1-0 lead that held up the rest of the way.

At the time, the win put the Mets eight over .500 for the first time since 2000, which was important in their bid for a Wild Card. The larger story of the game itself was Steve Trachsel returning from the DL and throwing eight shutout innings — and the Mets bullpen not blowing it.

But the reason I bring it up here is the feeling I had, that after a lifetime of the Mets losing games to teams for whom the difference was their having that one ultimately unstoppable homegrown young superstar hitter who just kept getting better, we finally had one of those guys.

David Wright never really had a prime in the classic sense. His career’s launch angle was promising, but the peak years that were supposed to come in the middle got lost in the clouds. Before we knew it, the climax was obscured by the denouement.

Yet that sense that he was already very good and was constantly getting better, which lasted several seasons, was prime enough while it was going on, no more so than on that Friday night in San Francisco.

I think also that while he was having his best years early, he was always so deferential to his veteran teammates, thus it was hard to think of those seasons as his prime or peak. Alas, they were. And, again, they were very, very good. I just wish there had been a few more.

James Schapiro (Shea Bridge Report)

When I was 12, I got Swine Flu, got my head smashed open with a flying ping pong paddle, and got diagnosed with epilepsy, all over a few weeks in the middle of the summer. Meanwhile, David Wright was coming back from being beaned by Matt Cain, in the midst of a season when he’d already moved into a ridiculously-proportioned Citi Field and lost all of his protection in the lineup. I turned out fine, and Wright did eventually come back from that beaning, although there’s an argument to be made that it was the first of a long train of injuries that led to where we are today. But we both made it back. And that, to me, is why we love David Wright so much.

My favorite memory of David Wright? His entire career. All the comebacks, the clutch hits, the home runs, the smiles. The grace and respect, the humility, the resilience, the leadership. The fighting back from injury, the dealing with a malcontent owner, the squeaky-clean image even on teams whose images have been far short of ideal. Pick one moment? That’s like asking to pick which bite of a Shake Shack burger is the best. You can’t. It all runs together, because Wright’s career, together, is what makes him David Wright.

I’ve seen him drive in winning runs, make diving stops at third, barehand bunts and fire them over to first, and shoot line drives down the first base line as if there was nothing too it. But other players can do those things too. But there’s no other David Wright.

So, my favorite memory of David Wright? His whole career, what’s gone and what’s yet to come. Being able to watch him play since 2004. Having a baseball hero I could be proud of. Having a captain who embodied the role. And knowing, every day since July 21st, 2004, and hopefully for a good few more years, that we had a guy who loved playing baseball more than anything else, and wanted nothing more than to take the field for his team — our team — and play the game the right way, the only way he knew.

To understand, Schapiro’s love of Wright all the more, please read Ballad of David Wright and The Captain and the Epileptic Chopstick pieces.

Mets Daddy

 It’s odd.  There are many moments which probably should be my favorite moment.  I was there when he hit a game winner off of Mariano Rivera.  I was also there when he hit the first regular season and first World Series home run in Citi Field history.  However, when I think back on his career, one moment sticks out above all the rest.

In what was a magical 2006 regular season, we saw Wright begin to emerge as a real and not just an emerging star.  For him it all seemed to coalesce around the All Star Game.  He was voted as the starter over players like Miguel Cabrera.  He was not only a surprising inclusion in the Home Run Derby, but also a finalist with him losing out to Ryan Howard. Heading into the game itself, the Mets, and especially David Wright, were on the forefront of everyone’s minds.

With that prologue, Wright stepped in against Kenny Rogers in the bottom of the second inning, and he hit a laser which cleared the fences for a solo home run.  It was almost as if with that homer Wright was announcing to the baseball world he’s now a star, and the Mets were going to be a force to be reckoned with for years to come.

As an aside, it was great to see Wright hit that homer off the man who walked Andruw Jones.

Overall, when I think of all the great moments of Wright’s career, I think back to that one.  That was the moment when he played with the same joy and enthusiasm Mets fans had watching him.  It was a time when everything seemed possible.

In case, you have noticed, Michael Ganci of Daily Stache has not participated in the last two roundtables.  He has a really good reason for not participating as he got married over the weekend..  On behalf of myself and all those who participate in the roundtable, we wish him and his wife a lifetime of happiness.

  • March 19, 2018
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