David Wright showed young Mets how to be good Mets
David Wright greets current players, including Sean Manaea, after his number retirement ceremony before a game between the Mets and the Cincinnati Reds at Citi Field on Saturday. Credit: Jim McIsaac
David Peterson never played with David Wright at the major-league level.
But it was away from the limelight in 2018 when Peterson, the Mets’ 2017 first-round pick, received an up-close glimpse of why the franchise’s captain was so revered.
A then-22-year-old Peterson was with the St. Lucie Mets, the franchise’s High-A affiliate at the time, when Wright — diagnosed with spinal stenosis in May 2015 and severely limited by injury for the final four years of his career — played 10 rehab games with the team.
A month later, after St. Lucie’s season had ended, the Mets summoned Peterson to Queens to throw live batting practice to Wright ahead of what ultimately would be the final two games of his career.
For Peterson, it was impossible not to learn from those moments.
“You see someone like that, you obviously know the person, but to see the professional that he was,” Peterson told Newsday ahead of Wright’s number retirement ceremony at Citi Field on Saturday afternoon. “The way he went about it, just trying to get back to have a last at-bat or have a last inning in [the] field, whatever it was that he was — in his mind — trying to get to.
“I think you can’t help but be inspired by that.”
Peterson, now 29 and named an All-Star this month for the first time, recalled Wright going through four hours of treatment and activation just so he could play three innings in a rehab game.
“If he’s doing all that with the shape that he’s in, and the pain that he’s feeling, and everything that’s going on — me as a 22-year-old spry kid, like I have no excuse,” Peterson said. “It was a huge motivation for me and just something that continued to be another building block on all of the influences I’ve had in my life in terms of examples of hard work. He was just another one that showed me how it was done.”
Wright played in only 83 MLB games after the spinal stenosis diagnosis, including the 2015 run to the World Series.
He had only three plate appearances in his final two games in September 2018. Peterson, who was joined by Freeport’s Justin Dunn, the team’s 2016 first-round pick, to pitch to Wright, was one of the last pitchers The Captain ever faced.
“He treated us the same way he would treat Wilmer [Flores] when they were rehabbing together,” Peterson said. “He treated everybody like they were the most important person, and I think I’ve learned a lot in terms of treating people that way as a professional.”
For the last two games of his career, Wright was a teammate of two players still on the roster: Brandon Nimmo and Jeff McNeil. He never played with Pete Alonso in the big leagues, but they were St. Lucie teammates for one game in August 2017 and Triple-A Las Vegas teammates for two games in August 2018.
On Saturday, Wright touched on his appreciation for homegrown Mets such as Peterson, Nimmo, McNeil and Alonso.
“Those are the types of guys that — not that I don’t root for everybody — but that I have a genuine rooting interest for because I know how special it is to put that uniform on, in particular for a long period of time,” Wright said. “So those homegrown types of guys are guys that I certainly pull for that, whether it’s once a year when I was seeing [Peterson] in 2018, that I try to explain — as best I can put into words — the impact and the meaningfulness of putting that uniform on.”
Daniel Murphy, drafted by the Mets in 2006, was among Wright’s former teammates in attendance Saturday.
Murphy’s first interaction with Wright as his teammate came before his debut in 2008. Murphy had an old wallet that needed to be replaced. Wright, known for his pranks, put the wallet in a shredder.
The next day, Murphy had a brand-new wallet — courtesy of Wright.
“He was always welcoming, and at the same time welcoming in a way in showing you by his actions,” Murphy said. “And then if you needed to [be shown], like, this is what it looks like to be a pro in New York and show up to work every day and be a proper teammate . . .
“He always [had] almost an open-door sort of policy where there was no question you couldn’t ask him. And he’d always give you a sincere answer.”
After the Mets’ 5-2 loss to the Reds on Saturday, Nimmo spoke about the wisdom Wright passed down to him, including his workouts, his recovery and how to handle the New York media.
“He worked harder than anybody else, and I saw that,” Nimmo said. “I got to watch it in person. And so not only did his words of ‘here’s what you need to do, here’s what you need to be willing to do to outwork people,’ not only did I hear those words, but I saw him put it into action. And I think for me, that spoke even louder than the words because there was weight behind it.”
Ben Dickson is Newsday Sports' general assignment reporter. He joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.
