Having Left Sockers, Wright Goes From Watcher to Watched

It’s nearing the midnight hour at the Richfield Tavern, where the beer prices are low, the lights are lower, and the ceiling is really low.

The fun is just beginning.

The Sockers, celebrating a victory over the Cleveland Crunch, are creating their usual stir. Brian Quinn is at the bar, singing some Irish song about a chicken. Defender Kevin Crow has just Fred Astaired on the top of a table.

Paul Wright is standing a few steps behind the commotion, observing.

What else is new?

Wright, now a forward for the Crunch, was a member of the Sockers’ championship team last season, and he spent most of his time watching.

There were benefits. Seeing what a Brian Quinn, or a Branko Segota or a Steve Zungul does with the ball is good for any rookie. And playing in San Diego, where he was a bit of a legend at Grossmont High, was a kick, as were his always-goofy teammates with their pranks, gags and championship rings.

Yet the one problem with all of it was that he was just an observer. Oh, he played an occasional shift and picked up a goal here and an assist there. And he did learn. But he was really just a guy with a flattop haircut, peering over the fence, wishing he could hop it and join in the fun.

“I never really got a chance to show what I could do,” says Wright, who was left unprotected by the Sockers at the end of last season and selected by the expansion Crunch in the free agent draft. “I like this much better. I love to go out there and play every day. Last year, when I went out there to play I only had a few shifts. I had to do something right then. Now I’ve got the whole game. I can just kind of pick my times when I want to turn it on.”

At first, Wright, 20, wasn’t even sure he would go to Cleveland. It’s tough to picture yourself doing battle with winter in Ohio, where the wind can sting like a slap in the face, when you’re sitting on the beach in San Diego and having a good old time with your friends.

So for a while, Wright didn’t deal with it. He partied, played for the Nomads. He put off making plans.

But when the sun set on summer, and all his buddies began to disperse back to the nine-months-a-year career that is known as college, Wright figured it was about time he went back to work himself. After all, it’s not all that tough to go to the mall and pick up heavy sweaters and a winter coat.

“Summer was over,” Wright says. “Everything was coming to a close. People were going back to school, getting on with their lives. I thought I might want to get on and do something else with my life, too.”

He dropped by Cleveland a few weeks later to check things out. It was training camp time. Wright showed up wearing that Southern California, lay-back-and-enjoy-things expression. You know, chill out and don’t hassle it and all that good stuff.

“I just kind of strolled in there all relaxed and not looking like I was too enthusiastic about it,” says Wright, who had yet to sign a contract. “They started calling me Charlie Hustle because I looked like a turtle.”

They’d get on him about his lack of desire to run sprints. Thing is, Wright is probably the fastest player in the MISL. He doesn’t have a whole lot to prove.

So he would say: “Just wait till the games.”

Just wait.

Wright signed his contract and burst out of the gates, impressing everybody with his finishing skills and ability to get to the ball. People enjoyed watching him play. He was a legitimate member of the team, not a bystander.

Not to say everything was perfect.

A dozen or so games into the season, his performance began to go flat. He burned out. This was new territory; he had never played full shifts in every game before.

“You could see him kind of wear out a little bit, because it’s the first time that he’s not only expected to play but expected to contribute,” says Kai Haaskivi, the Crunch’s player/coach. “With San Diego, if he was able to produce every third or fourth game, that was a bonus. Now, all of a sudden, it’s turned into an expectation to produce night after night. So I think it was natural that his performance leveled off a bit.”

Recently, it picked up again. Wright has 12 goals and 10 assists in 31 games for a total of 22 points, four in the past three games. He also is an important member of Cleveland’s penalty-killing unit, which has given up just six goals this season and scored five.

The consistency is expected to come with time.

“It’s not like we expect things to happen over night,” Haaskivi says. “But he’s definitely on the right track. He’s got a good head on his shoulders.

“He’s playing and he’s playing well. And there’s no substitute for that. A player’s got to make that decision sometime during his career. Are they happy just sitting on the bench on a good team or do they really want to play? And Paul wants to play.”

Anyway, Cleveland isn’t so bad. Wright carries a pen with him wherever he goes for signing autographs. When he’s not at the Richfield Tavern, he goes to this other place called Rio’s, where Eddie Johnson, linebacker for the Cleveland Browns, hangs out. Wright is now a self-proclaimed Browns fan. Doesn’t care for the Cavs, though.

“Naw, I don’t like the Cavs,” he says. “The Cavs stink.”

So you won’t find Wright among the fans at an NBA game. But he doesn’t worry too much about it. This year, he has become more than just a spectator.