Ricky Pearsall’s loved ones were quick to send the 49ers rookie thoughts and prayers after he was shot by a 17-year-old boy in a robbery attempt Saturday in San Francisco.
However, their text messages weren’t actually reaching the recovering Pearsall -- they were going to 12-year-old Lincoln Shreck from Arizona.
Shreck spoke about his phone recently blowing up with Gabriella Bachara of Phoenix's 12 News Wednesday, and he -- who had gotten his phone earlier this year -- explained the mixup.
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"We assumed it had to be somebody's old number," Shreck told Bachara.
Indeed. The youngster’s phone number originally belonged to Pearsall, who also grew up in Arizona.
What are the odds?
"I was responding 'wrong number' to as many as I could, and after a couple of them, somebody responded that it was the former number of an NFL player," Shreck added. "I was just kind of shocked and confused.”
San Francisco 49ers
Bachara added that Shreck doesn’t follow football and didn’t know who Pearsall was before he received hundreds of texts wishing the wide receiver well.
Shreck, at least, knows who the 23-year-old Florida product is now.
"Hey Ricky, I know you probably have a new number," Shreck read to Bachara from a message he received. "Praying for you tonight."
"Really glad you're OK, kid. God bless you. We love you," Shreck read in another text.
Fortunately, Pearsall is doing great and the Shreck family knows it isn’t going nuts.
And Shreck, being the considerate kid he is, is more concerned with getting the loving messages to Pearsall.
"I'm sure he's getting a lot of feel-better texts but he's getting more than he's even seeing," Shreck said. “I mainly hope that this just gets to Ricky. I think that's very important for him to know because I know he's going through a very hard time right now."
Pearsall has the support of the 49ers, loved ones and his fans as he recovers from the nightmare of an incident. And soon, hopefully, he’ll see all the texts that mistakenly went to Shreck.
Maybe Pearsall and Shreck, too, can meet one day. After all, the 49ers are NFC West rivals with the pair’s hometown Arizona Cardinals.
San Francisco will play Arizona at State Farm Stadium in Phoenix on Jan. 5.
Who knows, perhaps they can do a jersey-for-text-messages swap after the game.