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This article was published 10 year(s) and 10 month(s) ago

L.L.W.S. coach, player have Lynn connection

Bob Keaney

August 16, 2014 by Bob Keaney

On Friday, Mary Wright, the executive assistant to the Parking Director at Lynn City Hall, had her chair parked in front of a high-definition TV set to watch her grandson Brendan Wright play outfield in the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.Mary Wright, the first female president of the Pine Hill Little League in the early 1980s, was zeroed in on number 8, Brendan, her second grandson to play in the World Series, and her son Matt Wright, the pitching coach for Cumberland, Rhode Island as millions of fans around the world watched the 68th version of the World Series.The eyes of Texas and the world were upon the Wrights and the Cumberland squad as they took on Pearland East Little League from Pearland, Texas. Pearland won, 6-4.One of Pearland’s fans was a 77-year-old former Little Leaguer who played in the very first Little League World Series game in 1947 … on the same diamond.While watching Brendan, Mary Wright recalled vividly when Brendan’s older brother Chris, now 15, was on the world stage at Williamsport in 2011.”Chris pitched and hit well that year, and he’s now a very good player at Cumberland High School. He just returned from North Carolina, where college baseball scouts watched him play. He eats and sleeps baseball,” continued Mary Wright.While Williamsport is about 400 miles away from Lynn, she only had to walk 40 yards to watch sons Matthew and Mark play in the Pine Hill Little League at Gallagher Park back in the 1980s. Matt Wright was an all-star pitcher and outfielder on the 1984 Tigers, who won the Lynn City Series championship (August marks the 30th anniversary) when her late husband Wayne was a highly skilled manager with Larry Donovan and Norbert Beaulieu as coaches.”Wayne was a wonderful guy, great husband and father, and a terrific coach. He is sorely missed,” said Mary Wright. “Several of Wayne’s former players recently called me when they saw Matt on TV to say how much he reminded them of Wayne when he coached them and how much Brendan resembles Matt.”Mary Wright’s daughter Wendy and her husband Mark are parents of a baseball standout of their own in son Liam Johnston, whose pitching and home-run 2012 heroics sparked manager Pete Dawson’s Pine Hill Reds to the Lynn City Series championship at Tony Luciano’s Wyoma Field.Looking back, Mary Wright also enjoyed St. John’s Prep baseball games when son Matthew pitched there.”Matt is now an occupational therapist for the Rhode Island School Department,” she said. “He first met his wife Michelle (Peluso) at Quinnipiac College, and then they moved to Cumberland.”

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