If you heard David Wright with Joe & Evan on WFAN Monday, you surely heard him mention how he was enjoying seeing his children grow up, and coaching his three-year-old's co-ed tee-ball squad.
Well, there's an even better story within that last note, as Wright later expounded on during an appearance on CBS Sports Radio's Zach Gelb Show later Monday night.
"So, it's kind of a funny story – my first game, I got there early because I didn't know what to expect, and one of the coaches has to set up the field," Wright said. "So I'm the first one there, and the opposing coach comes up and introduces himself, and I tell him, 'I'll let you take the lead here, you let me know the rules and I'll follow suit.'"
The other coach was apparently thrilled…because out there in SoCal, where Wright lives now, his celebrity apparently doesn't precede him.
"So he goes, 'I played a little college ball, I was pretty good,'" Wright said, "and then he asked me, 'did you play?' and I said 'oh, I dabbled a little bit,' and I got a nice chuckle out of that."
If 1,585 games over 14 seasons is dabbling, well, he dabbled more than a little, but for Wright, it was just fun to get a chance to be "dad" and not "former MLB star."
"It was kind of fun to just turn on that dad moment, where you're just coaching a team, and they're running the wrong way on the bases and don't know where the positions are," he laughed, "but they get the biggest smiles on their faces when they finally make contact off the tee for the first time, and it's pretty rewarding."
The whole "not knowing who David Wright is" angle was still amusing to Zach, though, considering Wright was a .348 career hitter against the Dodgers, and the Mets beat L.A. in two different NLDS in 2006 and 2015.
"My wife is from out here…I guess I thought I was better than I was, and maybe I didn't make my mark against the Dodgers as much as I thought?" Wright laughed. "We got them twice in the postseason, but I guess it wasn't enough."
