As his MLB career begins, those who helped lift James Wood cheer him on (2024)

“And I was like, ‘I don’t really know what’s going on here,’” Wood said with a laugh.

Wood played for the Red Wings that Friday and had his chat with LeCroy, who confirmed the player’s growing suspicions. He drove back to his hometown in Maryland on Saturday and on Sunday spent time with his family.

The next day, July 1, Wood stood in left field at Nationals Park and made his major league debut, a significant moment for player and club, which has endured a gutting, years-long rebuild. Wood, who grew up in Olney, Md., has impressed in the early days of his MLB career. He has already climbed the Nationals’ batting order and entered Monday batting .320 with a .932 OPS.

Amid this booming and chaotic week, Wood has popped up on social media with highlights of his at-bats and big moments. Through it all, faces old and new — coaches, teammates, friends, family members — who have supported and believed in Wood, counseled him or helped him get here have followed along.

His parents watched from the stands as this new chapter of their son’s life began. So, too, did Nationals fans, who sat through sticky July days and nights to catch a glimpse of the future. Then there were Nationals players and coaches, who are just getting to know the soft-spoken guy who now shares their clubhouse. And there’s the high school basketball coach who never forgot him.

“It was great. I wouldn’t have made it here without all the support I had,” Wood said Friday. “So just having all those people be able to make it here and just being super close, it was unbelievable.”

Pat Behan can go months without leaving home. Doing so is a massive undertaking, requiring a team of caregivers and family members, bags stocked with medical supplies and a wheelchair that makes an uncomfortable life even harder.

In 2022, Behan was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a terminal neurological disease previously known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. He was 34 at the time, coach of the boys’ basketball team at St. John’s College High in the District. But now one of his former players was making his MLB debut. And Behan wanted to be there.

“He’s a wonderful young man and has such a supportive family,” Behan said while using the assistance of a communication device. “I wanted to do whatever it took to get here. Very proud of him.”

Behan coached Wood for about half a season before Wood transferred, but the impression he made — quiet, kind and laid-back, with the best vertical Behan had ever coached — stuck. Their families remained tight. In 2022, Wood visited Washington to attend a fundraising event for Behan. Since then, said Behan’s wife, Nataly Johanson-Behan, life has gotten harder for her husband, and Behan, who stopped coaching last year, has gotten weaker.

“So for him to go somewhere?” Johanson-Behan said. “It really has to be something that he’s passionate about. This is one of them. … There was no hesitation.”

Behan can no longer talk and now uses a screen that tracks his eye movement to type. As the Nationals played July 1, he would type messages every few minutes, asking for someone to adjust his head or limbs or bring him pain medication.

When Wood came up to bat, though, communication ceased. For six pitches, Behan soaked in the moment from a suite at Nationals Park. On pitch No. 7, as Wood ripped an opposite-field single for his first MLB hit and the suite and the crowd erupted, Behan was as expressive as his body allowed, vigorously tapping the side of his left sneaker on the side of the wheelchair’s footrest. “Awesome,” he wrote. “A professional at-bat.”

That night, cameras also found the former coach, who was shown on the video screen for the crowd at Nationals Park. Down on the field, someone else noticed the scoreboard display, too. And in the suite, Behan turned his focus back to his communication device, this time sending a message to his wife.

“Did u c James pointing?” it read.

Parra, who is now the Nationals’ first base coach, was throwing batting practice to Wood on Tuesday when the outfielder took two pitches inside that he didn’t like, which drew some laughs from Parra and Ricky Gutierrez, Washington’s third base coach. Wood promptly sent the next pitch to the second deck in right field. “Goodbye!” yelled Chris Johnson, the Nationals’ assistant hitting coach.

The next round, Parra asked Wood to call his shot. Wood pointed his bat toward center field and smirked as he settled in. He did hit a few back up the middle, but none left the park. Parra, apparently still caretaker of the Nationals’ vibes, later said he was trying to get Wood to relax.

“The last few days for him, it’s been a lot of stuff — media, people, friends,” Parra said. “The first time in the big leagues, it’s a lot. I just really want to tell him to just enjoy it.”

A few days after that, Parra, who had to navigate his way around the horde of cameras that descended on Nationals Park for the prospect’s debut, wasn’t talking about Wood’s defense or his hitting. What stood out the most to him, he said, was that Wood’s personality had not changed from what Parra saw in spring training, even amid all the fanfare.

“He’s a smart guy. He plays hard. He listens a lot,” Parra said. “He’s the guy that, when you say something to help him, he gets it and he does it. But I think what’s more important is that he’s a really humble guy.”

Kenny Wood sat up in his seat and leaned forward Wednesday, just as he had for his son’s other at-bats that night. His wife, Paula, and daughter, Kayla, looked on next to him. James Wood was at bat for the Nationals. It was the seventh inning of a tie ballgame, and their son had a chance to be the hero.

From their seats behind home plate, Kenny and Paula watched James swing through a 1-0 slider out of the strike zone. “Ugh,” Paula said. She put her hands on her head and looked at Kenny, who laughed and replied, “He’s got it.”

The Woods rarely get jittery anymore when James is hitting, but his first week in the big leagues had been a test. Kayla measured her heart rate throughout the week. The third Wood sibling, Sydney, works for the San Antonio Spurs and delayed her arrival to NBA Summer League so she could see her brother play. Kenny thought he would be nervous, he said, but then saw his son, who looked so comfortable. That made it okay, he said. Paula said seeing him check off a few milestones in the first game helped.

“I’m glad that he got his first hit and his first strikeout out of the way,” she said. “Now he can go play.”

From a purely game-day experience perspective, Wednesday could have gone better for the Wood family. In the fourth inning, a fan stood in front of Paula and Kenny, blocking their view of James’s at-bat. Paula stood on her toes and Kenny frantically leaned to the left so he could see James ground out to third. Wood singled in the sixth, but their view was obstructed again, this time by Teddy, the racing president. All Kenny and Paula could do was laugh.

No one was in their way in the seventh, when Paula and Kenny watched from the edge of their seats. Wood hit a single up the middle, driving in Lane Thomas and bringing the family to its feet. Paula high-fived Kenny, then gave Kayla a hug. She didn’t let the significance of the moment fall to the wayside.

“First run and first RBI this game,” she said. “His batting average went up against lefties, too.”

On Wood’s first day in the majors, Ildemaro Vargas saw a crowd of reporters and cameras at the outfielder’s empty locker, two seats down from his own, and quipped, “Hay un prospecto!” After Wood’s third game, the third straight time reporters requested Wood, Vargas cracked another smile as his new teammate approached the locker. “Every day?”

“It’s cool,” said center fielder Jacob Young, who has played alongside Wood at three levels of the organization. “Obviously, I mean, the cameras are cameras. But it’s cool to have just excitement around the org — that’s what we all want. We think we’re really close. So we want that excitement.”

Wood has been calm and prepared in these early days of his MLB career, his teammates say. He spends a lot of time on the iPad. At 6-foot-7, he is taller than anyone they have played with. He doesn’t dominate conversations, Vargas said through a team interpreter, but when Wood does speak, others quiet down and listen up. The only time they have sensed any anxiety is when he overthrew Young while warming up before his debut, though Young attributed that, in part, to a difference in height. (“He has to throw downhill,” Young joked.)

It’s a show for them, too. Young said some opposing pitchers have seemed intimidated by Wood, nibbling at the edge of the plate. Vargas — who calls Wood “El Big Man,” while a handful of young players, including Wood, call Vargas “El OG” — asked Manager Dave Martinez for the lineup card after Wood’s debut.

“Because, you know, I was playing next to him,” the 32-year-old journeyman said, referencing Washington’s batting order that night. “Big-time prospect who is going to be in this game a long time.”

Vargas sat down for a chat with the 21-year-old when he first arrived in Washington’s clubhouse. The game is the same, Vargas told him, a tick quicker than what he was used to in the minors but nothing a player with Wood’s capabilities couldn’t handle. Vargas, the team’s gregarious and goofy veteran, wanted to help Wood stay loose and feel welcome. More than anything, he said, he wanted Wood to know he was there if he needed him.

The ball left Wood’s bat on a bright and muggy Saturday and traveled 383 feet. It sailed into the left field seats at Nationals Park, where a teenager from Northern Virginia had just enough time to shift to his right, putting himself in position.

Cason Kelley lives in Leesburg, about an hour from Nationals Park. He often comes to games with his friend Jackson Merhaut, who is a Nationals fan. Kelley roots for the Milwaukee Brewers but on Saturday wore a Stephen Strasburg jersey to the park. Merhaut and Kelley, both 17, had seats in left field, with a clear view of the player they came to see.

Wood’s home run came in the second, off St. Louis Cardinals right-hander Lance Lynn. It was Washington’s third homer of the day and the first of Wood’s MLB career. As the ball fell to the crowd, it ricocheted off another fan’s hands and then dropped to the concrete, up for grabs. Someone nearly beat Kelley to it, but he dived over a row of seats and snagged it first.

“I was just so happy,” Kelley said. “I don’t even know what I was feeling. I’ve never felt anything like that before.”

A few moments later, Kelley sat on the back row of Section 104, red-faced and beaming. A team employee got his information as he held the ball and stared at it. Merhaut called his friends on FaceTime to show them — his hands on his head in shock.

Kelley understood the magnitude of what he was holding, as did those in the crowd around him. One fan jokingly said: “Make them give you everything!” “Don’t give that up for anything!” another said.

“It’s just fun getting to see him play,” said Kelley, who returned the ball to the player who sent it sailing his way. “He’s going to be great one day.”