Why will there never be another MLB player like Willie Mays

Frank Robinson, one of the greatest players of all time, was once asked if Willie Mays was the best player he had ever seen. Robinson had this annoyed look on his face and he rolled his eyes and was insulted that such a question had been asked. After a period of silence, he replied, “Of course it is. It’s as good as you want it to be. You can’t overstate how good it is.”

Willie Mays is the greatest center fielder of all time, the greatest giant of all time, and still, 73 years after his debut, the greatest combination of power, speed and defense in the history of baseball.

“When he came to us in 1951,” former Giants manager Leo Durocher said, “I never saw anyone quite like him.”

Major League Baseball had never seen anyone like him before, nor has it since. Mays was Ken Griffey Jr., but better, and he preceded Griffey by 40 years. Mays won the National League Most Valuable Player Award in 1954 and 1965 and finished second twice more. He finished in the top six 12 times. He made the All-Star team 20 years in a row. He is, by most measures, the second-best player in history behind the little-understood great Babe Ruth. For those who recognize the game by breaking the color barrier in 1947, there was no better player than Mays.

“I was in awe of him,” Hall of Fame player Johnny Bench said. “The first time I met him (at the 1968 All-Star Game), the day before the game, he whispered in my ear, ‘You should do it.'” “When he left, I couldn’t even talk for a little while. It was like, ‘Oh my God, Willie Mays just talked to me.’

“With Willie, it was like Tiger Woods coming to your town, you always expected him to win,” Giants Hall of Fame broadcaster Lon Simmons said in 2008. “The fans expected a miracle from Willie every day. He gave them a miracle every day.”

“His athleticism set him apart from others,” Robinson said. “The black player’s athleticism changed baseball after 1947. There was no better athlete than Willie Mays.”

Mays was born into it. His mother was a great athlete. His father was a great quarterback as well. His son, Willie Howard Mays Jr., was so advanced growing up in Westfield, Alabama, that he played against 18-year-old players when he was 10 years old. Mays played for the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro Leagues when he was 15 years old. In 1950, when he was 18, he signed with the New York Giants for $15,000 (he bought a car but couldn’t drive it, so it became his community car). He spent two years in the minor leagues, then joined the Giants in May 1951 after turning 20. Durocher placed him third in the order, and after a 1-for-25 start, he went on to win the Rookie of the Year Award and help the Giants overcome a 13½-game deficit to the Dodgers to win the series. banner. He was oblivious to the pressure. He was as natural a talent as anyone had ever seen.

“The game was always easy for me,” Mays said.

I showed. Mays was as agile a player as ever, an imposing combination of speed and tremendous power packed into a 5-foot-11, 185-pound package. He played with a certain style, and he pleased the fans in every way. It was “Say, kid.” There was no one like him.

Mays hit 660 home runs, fifth all-time. He led the league in home runs four times, had six 40-plus seasons and led the league in slugging five times, all while playing a significant portion of his career in the bullpen and in the pitcher era.

“Batting on a candelabra was like hitting into a void: you hit the ball, and the ball got sucked back in,” Robinson said. “If he had just played in a fair park for hitters, he would have struck out a lot.” More colleagues.

Mays also might have hit more home runs if he played in today’s era, with its lower mound, smaller pitches, smaller hitting zone, and almost everything designed to help the hitter. In 1968, he drove in an NL hitter with a home run of 100 runs. In 2000, 21 NL batters did so.

Hall of Famer Joe Morgan once said: “Willie Mays, today, might have reached 80 in one season.”

But what separates Messi is his speed. He stole 338 bases. He led the league in stolen bases for four straight seasons with an average of 33 per season. When he stole 40 bases in 1956, it was the most by any NL player since 1929.

“He could have stolen a lot of bases if he wanted to,” Robinson said. “But back then, you were stealing a base just to help your team win the game.” He could have stolen $50 a year if he wanted to.

“He was the best first baseman I ever saw,” Simmons said.

He was also a great defender, perhaps the greatest defensive midfielder of all time. He won 12 Gold Gloves, the most of any center fielder, and they didn’t start awarding Gold Gloves until 1957, his fifth full season. In 1968, he won the Gold Glove at the age of 37; At the time, he was the oldest player to win the midfielder’s title. In the 1954 World Series, Mays’ back-to-the-plate play in deep center against the Indians’ Vic Wertz is considered the most famous defensive play of all time. Mays can throw as well as any quarterback. He was going to have an assist on all four bases in one game, but Giants second baseman Tito Fuentes dropped the ball on a tag game. In 1965, Mays became the first player to win a Gold Glove in a 50-home run season. His signature basket catch was a never-to-be-repeated phenomenon. No one slid after a fly ball like Willie Mays.

He was the most complete player in baseball history, and the first true five-tool player. He didn’t just seek power; He hit .302 in his career, won a batting title and is one of five players with 3,000 hits and 500 home runs. He and teammate Willie McCovey were a devastating duo for the Giants for most of the 1960s.

“My last two years with the Giants, I would hit two home runs, but I would hold off at first so they would have to throw the ball to McCovey,” Mays said. He will stay at first base to make sure McCovey has a chance to hit. I had to maneuver some things around for our formation.

Mays was so good, some tackles were made around him — and by him, even in the All-Star Game.

“When I was pitching in the All-Star Game, (Dodgers manager) Walter Alston said to me, ‘Well, you know all these guys better than I do, you decide the lineup,’” Mays said. an act. I’ll hit the front to get something. I’ll put (Roberto) Clemente at second because he can hit behind the runner, and I’ll be at third base. I was going to hit Hank (Aaron) on third, he hit a fly ball, and before you knew it, our team was ahead.

Mays’ Giants were always ahead in 1954, when they won the World Series in his first full season (he missed most of 1952 and all of 1953 due to military service). In 1962, Mays hit a 49-homer, including one in the eighth inning on the final day of the season to beat the Astros 2-1 and pull the Giants into a regular-season matchup with the Dodgers. They played a three-game playoff. The Giants beat Sandy Koufax in Game 1 by a score of 8-0 behind two homers by Mays. The Giants won two of three to advance to their first World Series in San Francisco, but lost in seven games to the Yankees. Mays’ hit in the ninth inning put two on with two out, but McCovey’s lineout to Bobby Richardson ended the series.

Willie Mays in his prime was amazing to watch. Sadly, some people will remember him for falling on the warning track as a 42-year-old in the 1973 World Series. But replace that photo with these: The best athlete in the game, charging across the field, his hat flying off as he runs down the ball in right-center; That short, strong body that leans and hits the ball in places few can imagine; Those legs undulate at a quick second, finishing with a classic hook slide. They remember him as one of the greatest players of all time, a man who changed the game, a man of unparalleled talent over the past 75 years.