Craig Wright brings past to life with new baseball book
From Amber Kuehn at the Helena Independent Record on January 18, 2014:
Memorabilia fills a room in Craig R. Wright’s home, some of it even spilling out into the hallway. It’s a collection of baseball artifacts so extensive that it’s easy to forget you are aren’t in a museum.
The Helena resident — a baseball historian and writer — talks of each piece with pride. Every item has a story, often a specific memory attached, and Wright’s eyes light up as he takes you back to another era of the game.
There’s the catcher’s mask of Mike Piazza, a player whose career was advanced largely due to Wright’s support when he was a scout doing player evaluation. There’s a small, clear box containing dirt and grass from the original infield at Dodger Stadium when it opened in 1962, given to Wright by the Los Angeles GM during his 10-year career working for the Dodgers. There’s a box score from Nolan Ryan’s seventh no-hitter when Wright was working in Texas. (He was actually the one who generated the box score that appeared in thousands of papers on that legendary day.) Wright still considers it one of the best games he’s ever seen, and that’s coming from a man who has attended 90 World Series games, saw more than one perfect game from the stands and witnessed multiple players hit for the cycle.
He’s got Cal Ripken’s glove, Barry Bonds’ custom batting gloves and a number of autographed bats. He has Ty Cobb’s signature, Rickey Henderson’s shoes from his final year in the big leagues, and lighting up the room is a chandelier that once hung in Honus Wagner’s house.
Read the full article here: http://helenair.com/sports/baseball/bringing-the-past-to-light/article_84d0529a-800d-11e3-bd55-001a4bcf887a.html
Originally published: January 18, 2014. Last Updated: January 18, 2014.