2012 Chattahoochee Valley Sports Hall of Fame: Charles Wright was a softball 'Superman'

When Mike Macenko met the late Charles Wright in 1977, the Georgia Peach made an indelible impression.

Wright had the same effect on the rest of the national softball fraternity.

Wright, Jerome Bechard, Thermus Butler, O.L. Gilstrap, the late Jeff Weekley and Max Wilkes will be inducted into the Chattahoochee Valley Sports Hall of Fame at the Columbus Convention & Trade Center on Saturday at 7:30 p.m.

“Charles was playing for Ken Sanders in Georgia, and they came to the world tournament in Ohio, where I played,” Macenko said. “Ken Sanders had been ranked first or second all season. There were over 70 teams at the tournament, and our teams were playing each other. We had a good team, but they beat us 38-6 and Charles hit 5 home runs.”

For second baseman Macenko, another memory stands out. “I kept watching him run by me on the bases,” Macenko said. “After that game I asked ‘who are these guys and where did they come from?’. Charles set a precedent at such a young age.”

Wright was 25 years old.

Among his many softball honors, Wright was No. 5 on the list of all-time greatest softball players by Steve Dimitry’s Softball History site. Macenko tops that list.

“I’m No. 1 on that list, but I’m not better defensively than Charles,” Macenko said. “I hit more home runs than he did, but Charles Wright should be at the top. If he was, there wouldn’t be a complaint from anybody. He was as good an all-around player as ever played the game.”

Macenko and Wright shared a banner year in 1986. Wright broke the national softball home run record with 503 home runs, while playing with Steele’s Sports out of the Grafton, Ohio.

“We were a close knit family,” Macenko said. “The guys from Sports Illustrated spent two weeks with us on the road. We got a 15-page spread in the magazine (on July 28, 1986).

Macenko remained in touch with Wright though his home base is still in Cleveland and Wright and his family remained in rural Columbus.

“My daughter came to play in a tournament in Columbus in 2005,” Macenko said. “I called Charles and he came and watched her play. He didn’t like the hotel we were staying at, so he told us to come and stay at his house. He moved out and stayed at his parents’ house so we could have his house.”

It was the last time Macenko would see his long-time friend and teammate. He got the stunning news of Wright’s death in April of 2011.

Another teammate, Dave Steffan, was headed to Columbus with his sons to meet up with Wright and take a trip to Panama City.

“While they were in Panama City, they were going to do some hitting, so Charles was taking batting practice. That’s when he had the heart attack,” Macenko said

Wright died several days later at the age of 59. Former teammate, Greg Mathis, was badly shaken after visiting Wright in the hospital.

“I felt like Superman had died,” Mathis said. “Charles was bigger and stronger than anybody I’d ever seen. I never thought something like that would happen to him.”

Mathis was introduced to Wright by Columbus High coach Bobby Howard. “Coach Howard was my coach at Kendrick,” Mathis said. “He and Charles grew up together. Charles taught me how to hit a softball and we played some tournaments together in Florida.”

Wright was born in Columbus on March 13, 1952, the second of four children of the late Shirley and Buddy Wright. Jimmy, now 62, Charles, 59, and Paul, 58, all shared a passion for sports with their dad. Younger sister Kelley didn’t play any sports.

“We’d go to Lakebottom Park every Saturday and Sunday,” Paul Wright remembers. “We’d play baseball all day long, then have a picnic and eat hot dogs.”

Buddy Wright played softball, baseball and basketball. Paul Wright was a baseball star at Jordan High, while Charles and Jimmy played basketball.

Charles Wright started out playing with North Highland Assembly of God and in local tournaments. It didn’t long for him to draw the attention of powerhouse teams from all over the country. There was one significant problem for Wright when he played in church leagues.

“He never got to hit,” Paul Wright said. “Everybody would walk him.”

At the tender age of 21, Wright began playing for Valley Merchants (Alabama) then moved on to Ken Sanders (Georgia) and later Nationwide (Ohio). He also played for teams from Oregon, North Carolina and Connecticut.

Paul and Charles Wright were teammates from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s.

“We were the only ones from Columbus,” Paul Wright said. “The only time we played together was at spring training.

“During the season, we’d practice on our own all week. Our dad would pitch to us or we’d pitch to each other. We hit hundreds of balls a night. Then we’d meet up on the weekends to play.”

Tammy Wright, not surprisingly, met her future husband at a softball field in 1991. When they married in 1997, she had two children, Candace, 10, and Nick, 11. The Wrights had no children together. “He was my kid,” Tammy Wright said.

The Charles Wright family would take in four or five tournaments a season, which lasted from Easter until Labor Day.

“Charles’ favorite was one in Merryville, Tennessee, in the Smoky Mountains,” Tammy Wright said. “The park was down in a valley and there would be people stacked on the banks watching them play.”

Paul Wright remembers a special tournament in Canada. “It was on July 4 and there were 35,000 people lined around the field,” Wright said. “They loved softball up there.”

Paul Wright recalls the powerful home runs his brother hit. “We would do home run derbies in major league ballparks in between games of a doubleheader,” Wright said. “Charles would hit softballs out of the parks. He hit home runs in the Astrodome and in San Diego and Cleveland. The major league players would be standing around watching him hit.”

In addition to his passion for softball, Charles Wright was fiercely devoted to his family. When his mother was stricken with Alzheimer’s disease, Wright cared for her until she passed away in 2009.

“Charles thought nobody could take better care of her than he could,” Tammy Wright said.

Wright dealt with health issues later in his life. He stopped playing in 1997 at the age of 46. Shortly afterward, he suffered a silent heart attack.

“At first they thought it was heat-related,” Tammy Wright said. “Later they said it was a heart attack. The one that took him was also silent.”

Wright was stricken with colon cancer in 2007 and underwent 8 months of chemotherapy. Wright also had total knee replacement in 2008 after years of sports taking their toll.

Tammy Wright is uncertain how her husband would view his induction into the Hall of Fame as he shunned the spotlight where awards and honors are concerned.

“He always thought your sports ability should speak for itself,” Tammy Wright said.

Paul Wright summed up his older brother’s value to his team.

“If Charles was on your team, you had a good chance of winning.”

This story was originally published January 30, 2012 at 12:00 AM with the headline "2012 Chattahoochee Valley Sports Hall of Fame: Charles Wright was a softball 'Superman'."