Denard Span’s return to Tampa is a delight for his biggest fan
Wanda Wilson has had to dramatically alter her sleeping schedule this baseball season with her son, San Francisco Giants center fielder Denard Span. She lives in Tampa and Span is, for the time in his career, playing so many of his games at night on the West Coast. You can see how that would troubling.
She gets a welcomed reprieve from those late nights this weekend when Span returns home to Tampa with the Giants for an interleague series against the Tampa Bay Rays. It’s a Mother’s Day present of sorts on Father’s Day weekend. 
Span used to make regular trips back to his hometown for games during the first five years of his major league career when he played in the American League for the Minnesota Twins.
Trips home during the season are much more significant and special now that he has been in the National League for four seasons, three with the Washington Nationals and now this year with the Giants. Span has become a key member of this Giants team and one reason why San Francisco is 6.5 games ahead of rival Los Angeles Dodgers in the NL West heading into Friday night’s game, which is Yahoo Sports’ MLB Free Game of the Day. That means you can stream it free on Yahoo’s Sports Home, MLB index and video home. First pitch is at 7:10 p.m. ET. Local blackouts apply, per MLB’s rules.
Friday is also Pride Night at Tropicana Field. Earlier in the week the Rays placed every seat in Tropicana Field that wasn’t already sold for the game on sale for $5 in hopes of generating a sellout. And they did. The club will donate the money to the Pulse Victim Fund, which is trying to raise $7 million for the 49 people murdered Sunday morning in the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando. 
Returning to Tampa isn’t just a chance to Span to see his mom and plenty of other familiar faces. It’s also a chance for him to briefly reconnect with a community he continues to give back to more than a decade after graduating from Catholic High School.
Through the Denard Span Foundation, the 32-year-old outfielder does what he can to assist single-parent families with school-aged children such as providing school supplies, a baseball camp and last year playing Santa Claus to 10 families in Tampa by providing them with a holiday meal and gifts.
“In the big scheme of things, I know it’s not huge,” Span told the San Jose Mercury News. “But I hope that through some of these events, even for that one moment, I can take some of the load off some of those parents.”
Span is often in the leadoff role in the Giants lineup and he’s been in that lineup a lot so far this season with Angel Pagan and Hunter Pence missing significant time with injuries. Span is hitting .257/.343/.353 with three home runs and 24 RBIs.
Span has played in 63 of the Giants 67 games to this point, which is likely more than manager Bruce Bochy planned on needing to use the 32-year-old when he signed as a free agent.
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Kyle Ringo is a contributing writer to Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @KyleRingo
