Let us add our voice to the chorus of celebrants singing the praises of Willie Mays, a baseball player as transcendent in his sport as Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan, Pele, Tiger Woods, Tom Brady, and Wayne Gretzky are to theirs. The Say Hey Kid was a quintuple threat, who could hit for power and for average, steal bases, had a cannon-like throwing arm, and won 12 Gold Gloves playing center field. His prowess can be measured quantitatively in his legendary career statistics, including playing in a record 24 All-Star games, as well as qualitatively, with his charismatic on-field exuberance and famous plays like “The Catch.” (Watch the video, it’s amazing.)
While his signature skills as a ballplayer are the stuff of legend, for us the significance of Willie Mays is his embodiment of a different era in American sports, the memory of which grows fainter with time. Back then, the barriers between sports superstars and sports fans were much narrower. Our heroes were human and relatable, lived in our neighborhoods, and had jobs in the offseason. Mays often played stickball with kids in the city. It is a time that lives in our collective memories in black and white pictures and news reels.
Mays was not only the oldest living Hall of Famer when he died at 93, but also one of the few remaining veterans of the Negro Leagues. Starting his baseball career with the Birmingham Black Barons in 1948, Mays was one of the first wave of Blacks to integrate Major League baseball when he debuted with the New York Giants in 1951, four years after Jackie Robinson broke the color line with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Read More
