Willie Mays was one of many best baseball gamers of all time, however even he tried his damnedest to get any benefit he may.
The Corridor of Famer died earlier this week on the age of 93, over 50 years after his illustrious profession ended.
Tributes have poured in since then, and one in all Mays’ fellow Corridor of Fame opponents, Johnny Bench, remembered the New York and San Francisco Giants legend on OutKick’s “Do not @ Me with Dan Dakich.”
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San Francisco Giants centerfielder Willie Mays, left, is tagged out right here at dwelling plate by Cincinnati Reds catcher Johnny Bench within the third inning. (Getty Photos)
“Willie was simply completely the perfect. He got here as much as dwelling plate and had that swagger,” Bench recalled. “He’d swing that bat forwards and backwards, his head would return.”
Nevertheless, these head actions have been apparently in an effort to know what pitch was coming, says Bench.
“Nicely, he had this factor, he’d need to steal indicators,” Bench stated. “His first base coach was Peanuts Lowrey, and Peanuts would go searching out of the teaching field, making an attempt to see the catcher giving him indicators. If he known as a curveball or a fastball, supposedly, if Willie hit a house run, Peanuts acquired a brand new swimsuit.
“So I am again there catching, and Willie is swing forwards and backwards, his head’s going again, and I am simply squatting again there. And he does this about seven or eight occasions. Lastly, he steps out of the field and stated ‘you gonna name a pitch or what?’ I stated ‘yeah, as quickly as you stop trying again right here.’ He was making an attempt to look again and steal my indicators, ‘oh man, you bought me! You bought me!'”
Outfielder Willie Mays, #24 of the San Francisco Giants, swings and watches the flight of his ball towards the New York Mets throughout a circa early Seventies Main League Baseball sport at Shea Stadium in Flushing, New York. Mays performed for the Giants from 1951-72. (Deal with Sport/Getty Photos)
BARRY BONDS, WILLIE MAYS’ GODSON, POSTS TRIBUTE TO FELLOW GIANTS LEGEND
Mays was one of many best ballplayers to ever grace a baseball diamond, starting in 1948 within the Negro Leagues. He made his MLB debut as a 20-year-old enjoying for the New York Giants. He would go on to be a 24-time All-Star, two-time MVP, 12-time Gold Glover, two-time All-Star Recreation MVP, Rookie of the Yr and 1954 World Sequence champion in an illustrious profession that led to a straightforward Corridor of Fame induction.
Mays was identified for his capacity to wow crowds with thunderous dwelling runs, slick baserunning and miraculous performs in heart area. One of the vital iconic performs ever in MLB got here in that 1954 World Sequence and was without end known as “The Catch.”
In his illustrious profession, he hit .301 with 660 profession dwelling runs. He’s one in all simply 4 gamers ever to have 3,000 hits with at the least 600 of them being dwelling runs (Hank Aaron, Albert Pujols and Alex Rodriguez).
He ended his profession in 1973 with the New York Mets, the place his No. 24 can also be retired.
Mays, who spent most of 1952 and all of 1953 serving within the Military, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by then-President Obama in 2015.
Willie Mays visits PS 46 in Harlem, New York, subsequent to the location of the previous Polo Grounds, the place the New York Giants performed earlier than shifting to San Francisco in 1958, on Jan. 21, 2011 in New York Metropolis. (Michael Nagle/Getty Photos)
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MLB is ready to play a regular-season sport on Thursday on the historic Rickwood Discipline in Birmingham, Alabama, the place Mays started his skilled baseball profession within the Negro League with the Black Barons, between the Giants and St. Louis Cardinals.
Fox Information’ Scott Thompson contributed to this report.
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