NY Mets’ Wright will give it his ‘best shot’ on playing this season

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — The big question surrounding David Wright is one that even he can’t answer. Can he play this season? “I’m going to give it my best shot, certainly,” the New York Mets captain and third baseman said Saturday from the dugout of the team’s training complex. “I probably have a lot of the same questions you’re asking me and a lot of people are asking of me. I just don’t know. It’s certainly been an uphill climb for me.

“To honestly answer your question, I just don’t know. I’d love to play, but my body’s got to hold up and have to cooperate with me a little bit.”

The 35-year-old Wright calls his health the “biggest hurdle.” The medical update to the media suggests no immediate expectation of him being penciled into new manager Mickey Callaway’s lineup anytime soon.

“I’m still in the rehab process,” he said. “But I feel like as far as getting further and further along, we’re at the point now where we can begin to try to ramp it up a little bit more.”

The seven-time All-Star has been in constant communication with the doctors who performed his back and shoulder surgeries.

“We want to make sure that when we progress to these steps that’s it’s not going to do anything that will kind of set us back. So for now we’re in the rehab process,” he said. “I guess baby steps are still steps in the right direction.”

Wright’s shoulder pain from three Florida State League games last August led him to shut himself down. He had shoulder surgery Sept. 5 to fix his right rotator cuff. The next month he had a laminotomy to remove a bony layer over his spinal canal to treat nerve compression.

He is close to his playing weight but his offseason workouts haven’t allowed him to put on any muscle. He hasn’t been running, choosing instead to focus on the areas on which he’s had surgery. He alternates his daily workouts — shoulder work one day, back exercises the next.

Wright says third base is in File, John Bazemore / AP

Mets third baseman David Wright has had back and shoulder operations and says his health is his “biggest hurdle.”

good shape without him. Recently acquired Todd Frazier, Jose Reyes, Asdrubal Cabrera and Wilmer Flores give the Mets quality options.