I’m the same age as David Wright and Jose Reyes. Actually, my birthday is smack in the middle of both of theirs, but I digress. My point is that these two former-franchise-cornerstones, while both being atop multiple New York Mets all-time lists, most likely have played their final game together on the same field.
Yes, David Wright is still on the 40-man roster and Jose Reyes is projected to be a utility infielder for the Mets this season, I know. As upsetting as it is to type this, the chances of them making even one final appearance on the left-side of the infield together for the Mets ever again are slim-to-none.
I hope just as much as anyone else that Wright, now 35-years-old, somehow miraculously returns from the who-knows-how-many surgeries that he’s undergone over the last few years. After his spinal stenosis diagnosis, he’s made umpteen attempts to get back to playing baseball. Each time, a new injury rears its ugly head and D-Wright is forced right back to rehabilitating himself back to being game-ready.
Oh, how I long for those opposite-field bombs that blasted off of No. 5’s bat, going over that beautiful blue wall anywhere from the Nikon sign to the GEICO sign in right-center, off the scoreboard or into the bullpen at Big Shea. All I ask for is one more. Just one. Why the Mets didn’t choose to move the fences in at Citi Field after the first half of its inaugural season, if only to accommodate their franchise-player, is beyond me.
Most of you can remember, quite well probably, those overwhelming feelings of pride, joy, and excitement in seeing two of the game’s best players not only lining up next to each other on the field but appearing to be the two best friends in the whole wide world off the field. I know I do.
The excitement that ran through Shea Stadium, Citi Field, our living rooms, or in our cars with Howie Rose on the radio screaming his head off, when Jose Reyes shot a frozen-rope into the gap and got to third-base before you could say, “that’s going to get to the wall”, was electric. Same went for whenever David Wright clobbered one of those aforementioned opposite-field blasts into his power-alley.
For a long time, we as a fanbase have somewhere in the back of our minds refused to believe that David Wright’s career is indeed over. I’m not ready to accept that fate, most of you aren’t ready to accept that fate, and neither is he.
As Wright faces yet another uphill climb toward once again stepping in onto that spongy patch of infield grass on Roosevelt Ave. in Flushing, selfishly, all I want is to see it just one more time.
The little-kid, the young man, and now the adult in me are all still holding out hope that one day, somehow, it could happen. And to be perfectly honest, I’m not ready to hear anything to the contrary. At least not until David Wright says it for himself.
