New York Mets: When Will David Wright Take The Field?

The New York Mets will take their time getting David Wright ready for the regular season, but when will he make his Spring Training debut on the field?

The New York Mets struggled at times last season trying to fill the void left by David Wright. The face of the franchise and starting third baseman battled spinal stenosis last season and missed four months as a result of it. Until the Mets acquired Kelly Johnson and Juan Uribe near the trade deadline, the Mets did not have much in the way of replacing Wright, as they were not prepared for him to miss that much of the season.

This time around, the Mets are prepared. The middle infield is greatly improved with Neil Walker and Asdrubal Cabrera taking over at second base and shortstop. It causes a trickle down effect, as Wilmer Flores is now a super sub utility player off the bench; he will probably get most of the playing time at third base when Wright needs a day off.

The Mets are putting in the necessary precautions to try and prevent Wright from aggravating the injury. They are easing him into Spring Training action, and have also set playing time goals for the regular season. The Mets are aiming to play Wright in 130 games to make sure that Wright isn’t overworked and is healthy and ready to play in meaningful games at the end of the season.

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But, when will Wright actually get onto the field and make more progress in his Spring Training workouts? According to ESPN New York’s Adam Rubin, Wright got his offseason regimen started late because doctors wanted him to have some downtime after the Mets made a run to the 2015 World Series.

“I played later, and then the doctors wanted a month of really doing nothing,” Wright said. “So instead of starting baseball stuff when I normally do in like December and really ramping it up in January when I get down here, I didn’t start baseball stuff until probably the beginning of February.”

With that timetable, it sounds as if Wright is multiple weeks behind from where he would normally be at this point in Spring Training. Instead of preparing for the regular season, Wright seems to be prepping just to make it through Spring Training at this point in time. But when asked about when he will take the field with his teammates, Wright was not able to provide an answer.

“That’s a very good question,” Wright said when asked about when he will get into a Grapefruit League game. “Today we did some running that I haven’t done before. I’ll come in tomorrow and see how I feel. If I feel good, I’ll progress from that. As far as running goes, I just started doing some cutting. I still have to some bases [to run]. I still have to do some turning type of stuff, and then I should be pretty close.”

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Whenever that time may come, the Mets and Wright will be patiently waiting for it to come. They will not push the envelope, as ensuring Wright’s health for the long run in the regular season is immensely more important than getting him into Spring Training games.

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