his uniform fit
better than everybody
else’s uniform
“You would stay on the bench during batting practice simply to watch him — and just watching him walk, even that was special,” said Cleon Jones, who grew up in Alabama idolizing Mays and ended up sharing the outfield with him when the Giants traded Mays to the Mets in 1972.
“I’m telling you, even his uniform seemed to fit better than everybody else’s uniform,” Jones said. “The players held him with a reverence that felt almost spiritual.”
From the article, Remembering Willie Mays as Both Untouchable and Human by Kurt Streeter.
Not much to say but I think of Jim Harrison in his book The Road Home when his lead character meets Sioux Lakota warriors, veterans of the wars with Custer.
Mr. Harrison writes, ” … warriors with a lineage that owed nothing to the white man. We did not live upon the same earth that they did and we flatter ourselves when we think we understand them. To pity these men is to pity the gods.”
I also want to point out that Mr. Mays did not play in the Major Leagues until he was 20 years old.
Al Kaline and Robin Yount both started when there were 18.
I think of the record book with two more seasons added to it.
Mr. Streeter writes, “How great was he?
Six hundred sixty. That is how many home runs bolted off Mays’s bat during his career. When the Say Hey Kid retired at the end of the 1973 season, only Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron had more.
Mays ended 23 major league seasons with a total of 3,293 hits and held a .301 lifetime batting average, eye-popping for a player with such power. Twenty-four times, he was named to the All-Star team. Twelve times, he won the Gold Glove Award. Ten times, he drove in more than 100 runs.
He was named the National League’s most valuable player twice. If it were not for a need to spread the award among players, some experts say, he could have been the M.V.P. seven more times.
Numbers and accolades tell only part of his story. For it was how Mays played — the way he bent the confines of baseball to his will with his smarts, his speed, his style and his power — that set him apart as the most deeply beloved of stars.”
Mr. Mays also missed a season due to having to fulfill his military service.
And it should be pointed out I guess that Jackie Robinson was rookie of the year, his first year, …when he was 28.
The New York Times closes its Obituary with:
When he was selected for the Hall of Fame, Mays was asked to name the best ballplayer he had ever seen.
“I think I was the best ballplayer I’ve ever seen,” he replied. “I feel nobody in the world could do what I could do on a baseball field.”
Not too many could argue.
I mean, to quote Cleon Jones once more, “I’m telling you, even his uniform seemed to fit better than everybody else’s uniform.”
No Haiku For You 