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Not many athletes can live up to their legend.
But Willie Mays did.
The man they called “The Say Hey Kid”, by way of his unmatched enthusiasm, truly was peerless on the diamond - the original five-tool player, long before such lingo entered the scouting lexicon.
Heck, his sheer brilliance is considered by some to the very origin of the term itself: Leo Durocher is said to have applied it to his budding superstar in the mid-1950s, right around the time Mays would have been rewriting what was possible in modern baseball.
After all, why force a player to specialize when they can do everything?
Hitting for average. A power-speed threat that remains nearly unequalled.
Defense, so exceptional, it is, still, akin to gospel. Willie Mays: the greatest centre fielder, the most complete player who ever laced up a pair of cleats.
The sight of his number 24 disappearing into the depths of the Polo Grounds? It will forever be burned into the mind’s eye for baseball fans of even passable standing. “The Catch”, the kind of play for which film seems too little: it is the type of excellence for which sporting dreams are made of.
One of baseball all-time entertainers, who once admitted he wore his caps a size bigger, just on the chance they might fly off while he was diving in the outfield. Not always because he always needed to dive per se but… why not, right?
Keep ‘em on their toes.
Mays died on June 18th, from what was later announced as heart failure.
He was 93.
He was probably the best all-around player when you take everything into consideration. It seemed that Willie never made a mistake.
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Per the Baseball Almanac, as of this writing (June 20, 2024) 20,655 players have found their way to the Majors.
No, that number is not a typo.
None of them though, were quite like Mays.
His professional career began when he was still in high school, the newest addition to Birmingham Black Barons, of the Negro American League.
Cat Mays, a player of local renown himself on the industrial circuit, had to sign off on his son joining the team as not only was he a minor, it clashed with the school’s football schedule.
As a compromise? The younger Mays only played home games, with his clearly apparent talent, ruffling the odd feather as he took playing time from the established players.
It didn’t matter.
Come the mid-point of the summer, he was starting in centre.
And dazzling though he was, Mays was also taken under the wing of Piper Davis - Davis, a career-long infielder in the Negro Leagues who mentored Mays in further refining his still-developing approach at the plate: a burgeoning player, struggling with off-speed pitches? It is a tale as old as time.
Though on that particular page, Mays wouldn't stay too long.
Almost right after graduation, he was signed by the New York Giants. By 1951, he was playing Triple A ball in Minneapolis.
And after just 35 games into that season, he was called up, even though Mays didn’t think he was ready - still unsure of his ability to hit advanced pitching.
New York Giants manager, Leo Durocher, calling Mays personally, couldn’t believe it.
“What are you batting right now?” asked Durocher.
“.477,” replied Mays.
He made his National League debut soon afterwards - May 25th, 1951.
It was only a few weeks after his twentieth birthday.
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So much of Mays’ baseball story, while defined by his all-world talent was contrasted by his modesty, his humanity: everyone else, they were amazed.
Mays wasn’t so sure.
Rather famously, he went 0-12 to begin his MLB career. He was terrified that he still couldn’t cut it. Yet three days later, he finally connected. His first hit, a home run off Hall of Fame pitcher Warren Spahn.
Spahn, to his credit? Well, rather amusingly, it seems he never quite got over it:
His first major league hit was a home run off me. [And] I'll never forgive myself. We might have gotten rid of Willie forever if I'd only struck him out.
Mays, batting .274 with 20 homers, would win the ‘51 NL Rookie of the Year but would miss most of the next two seasons due to military service.
When he returned to the bigs, in 1954?
He was history in motion, the best player in the sport.
He was the NL MVP, played a beautiful centre field, slugged 41 home runs, hit an NL-leading 13 triples, was a batting title champion (with a Major League-leading .345 BA) and fully, totally, cemented himself in baseball lore.
The stage, in hindsight, set itself: Game One of the 1954 World Series, Cleveland, who were winners of a then-record 111 games up against the Giants on their home turf, Manhattan’s Polo Grounds.
In the eighth inning, tied at 2, with two men on, Cleveland’s Vic Wertz takes Don Liddle 420-feet deep - in any other ballpark in America, it would have been a home run.
But the Polo Grounds had the deepest outfield in the Majors, at 483 feet, with Mays, on that at-bat, playing a particularly shallow centre.
And even now, 70 years later, watching the film back, it is as if you’re witnessing something other-worldly.
Just how in the hell did he make that play?
Mays, taking off running, completes an over-the-shoulder catch, whips around with such force he loses his cap (naturally) and throws an absolute bullet back towards the infield, all in the space of twelve-something seconds.
A ball hit 420 feet… but a catch (and the resulting tag) so incredible, it held the runners at first and third. No runs scored on the play. The Giants would go on to win the game, 5-2 and eventually the series, sweeping Cleveland.
Such monikers, in sports, in their simplicity, they can be tricky.
How many players, for example, have taken “The Shot?”, scored “The Goal” or made “The Save?”
But “The Catch”?
It is all Mays.
So too though, was so much of his career, beyond just his best-remembered play.
Such feats, they were his bread-and-butter.
He became a star in New York yes but he became a legend in San Francisco, where the Giants moved following the 1957 season. Mays, for over a decade, putting together perhaps the most consistent stretch of greatness ever seen on a diamond.
He would return to New York following a trade in 1972, such longevity, itself a testament to his ability, as he played parts of two seasons with the Mets.
And, of course, like so many athletes who perhaps waited just a moment too long, even if concluding their careers on their own terms, Mays wasn’t the same player.
Though who could expect him to be?
His power, his speed, his ever-present joy, they were rare sights in Shea Stadium.
But that isn’t what sticks out in memory, even if his final game was played decades ago now, in 1973.
For everything he was, it lives on in those that followed him, those that only heard his name, rather than seeing his exploits first hand, the reverence for which it was spoken.
An understanding of sorts.
For there was everyone else and then, there was Willie Mays.
The Say Hey Kid.
The greatest.
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Willie Mays, career highlights:
NL Rookie of the Year (1951)
2x NL MVP (1954, 1965)
NL Batting Champion (1954)
World Series Champion (1954)
12 Gold Gloves (1957-1968)
24-time All-Star1
4x NL Home Run Leader (1955, 1962, 1962, 1965)
4x NL Stolen Base Leader (1956-1959)
660 Home Runs
3,293 hits
.301 career-average
All-time outfield putout record: 7,095
Elected to Cooperstown in 1979
Presidential Medal of Freedom (2015)
From 1959 to 1962, MLB held two All-Star Games a year.