The relentless professionalism, the will to win, the character combined with talent and cool charisma. They add to the sum of what makes David Wright the closest thing the Mets — or perhaps any team in baseball, for that matter — have to Derek Jeter.
And the right hamstring strain Wright suffered in last night’s 11-inning, 4-2 victory over the Royals in Queens was positively Jeterian, both as it originated and was incurred.
For there was the face of the franchise refusing to leave the lineup, even though bothered by what had become a leg issue that had threatened to keep him out of Thursday’s game in Miami. There was Wright attempting to bust it down the line to beat out an infield grounder leading off the 10th, even after pledging not to do such a thing.
There was Wright hobbling off the field after in fact beating Miguel Tejada’s throw to first; hobbling off on the way to an interrupted season, his passion having overcome promises the world-class Met simply could not keep any more than Jeter ever has been able to ramp down his game.
Well, until this week, at least.
“The one thing [Wright] said is that he knew he could play but didn’t want to have to any fast burst,” was the way manager Terry Collins began his unhappy recap of events. “He extended it trying to help us win a baseball game.”
The Mets won the baseball game in the 11th when Eric Young Jr. crushed a two-out, two-run drive to right to bookend the night that had begun with Wright’s first-inning, two-run blow to left.
There were bleeps and bloopers, a mighty fine seven-inning performance by starter Dillon Gee and an inspiring return to the majors by Pedro Feliciano following nearly a three-year absence between the home runs that allowed the Mets to break the Royals’ nine-game winning streak.
But there in a more lasting moment was Wright, who will undergo tests this morning, lost for an indeterminate period of time after having started 104 of the team’s 107 games during which he has batted .309 with 16 home runs and 54 RBIs while proudly representing the franchise and the city as he has done since his Major League debut on July 21, 2004.
“There will be an MRI [exam this morning] and it’s not likely it will be all that good,” said Collins, no doubt kicking himself for allowing the captain to talk his way into the lineup on Thursday and again last night after clutching the hamstring on a steal of second against the Marlins in the eighth inning of a defeat on Wednesday night.
“It’s bittersweet at the moment.”
Baseball will bite you where and when you’re vulnerable. The game is like that. Last night, it took a chunk out of the Mets, whose hastily remade bullpen in the absence of Josh Edgin (rib stress fracture) and Bobby Parnell (muscle spasms in his neck) could not protect a 2-0 lead in the eighth and then could not close a 2-1 game in the ninth.
It was David Aardsma — who recorded 69 saves as the Mariners’ closer in 2008 and 2009 before arm issues derailed his career — who got the call to fill in for Parnell in the ninth.
First in the baseball alphabet, Aardsma was unable to nail down his first save in four years, quickly finding trouble from which he was ultimately bailed out by Feliciano after the tying run had scored.
“With what happened [with bullpen injuries], these guys went out and did the best they could,” said Collins, who had to use Carlos Torres, who had been scheduled to start today, for the final two innings.
They did the best they could. The night that had begun for the Mets with Wright smacking his 220th career homer to tie Mike Piazza for second on the franchise’s all-time list, 32 behind Darryl Strawberry’s record, had ended with their franchise player hobbling off the field.
In a New York baseball year in which Jeter played one of his team’s first 104 games, now there is the specter of Wright leaving the field with 65 games to go.