Dustin Pedroia played his entire career with the Boston Red Sox, but a New York Yankees documentary recently inspired a return to the cage.
ESPN’s “The Captain” documentary chronicling the life and career of Derek Jeter premiered this week and Pedroia was among the viewers.
Pedroia joined WEEI’s Rob Bradford on Audacy’s The Bradfo Sho to discuss David Ortiz’s upcoming Hall of Fame induction as well as the recent inspiration from “The Captain.”
“The other night I watched that Jeter thing and I’m like ‘Man, I miss playing,’” Pedroia said (37:30 in player above). “I got a cage in my house. I went in the cage for a little bit and was hitting missiles.”
Pedroia retired in February 2021 after a partial knee replacement a few months prior. He only played in nine games total in 2018 and 2019 after suffering a knee injury in 2017.
“That’s the problem I have. After I got done hitting, I’m like ‘It’s a damn shame, because now that I got my partial (knee) replacement, I can do everything now except run,” he continued. “So if I could run, I’d probably be leading the league in hitting. So it pisses me off.”
The gritty second baseman was a four-time All-Star, won the AL MVP in 2008, and won two World Series with the Red Sox. He finished his career with 1,805 hits and a .299 batting average.
Perhaps we could see a return to get above the .300 mark?
“If you give me your leg and I could run? You’d see it,” Pedroia laughed.
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