RIP, Dodgers worst Enemy passed away

Baseball royalty Willie Mays was essential to the rivalry between the Dodgers and Giants on both coasts. It says it all; he was also the best player Vin Scully had ever seen.

On Tuesday, the baseball world lost a titan with the passing of Willie Mays, 93. On a baseball field, the man was a legendary character whose feats are legendary because he could accomplish anything. Mays had a compelling case to be considered the greatest player in baseball history, and his game against the Dodgers only served to confirm that belief.

When the Giants and Dodgers moved to California in 1958, Mays was the team’s biggest star and helped bring baseball to the west coast. No one hit more home runs against the Dodgers than Mays’ 98, though Henry Aaron, another inner-circle legend, came close with 95 home runs against them.

Mays was the guy Vin Scully liked the most, according to the man who called baseball games for a whopping 67 years and witnessed almost all there is to see in the game. There isn’t a better recommendation than that. Ron Cey also had Mays as his favorite player.

In two historic best-of-three National League postseason series—in New York in 1951 and California in 1962—Mays and the Giants defeated the Dodgers. Baseball’s western expansion was cemented in 1962, 1965, and 1966 when the Dodgers and Giants finished first and second in the National League.

Mays hit.330/.374/.604 against Dodgers Hall of Fame right-hander Don Drysdale, which resulted in 13 of his 660 career home runs.

“Every at-bat, Drysdale knocked me down,” Mays admitted to Barry Tramel of The Oklahoman in 1997. Not each and every game. each at-bat.

Mays’s on-field exploits are legendary. Three times, he was the league leader in home runs, and four times, in stolen bases. In addition to placing in the top four six times, he earned two National League MVP awards.

It doesn’t seem possible that Mays is a 24-time All-Star, yet she made it happen.

Mays was just as amazing in centerfield as he was at the plate and on the bases. Only he is referred to in baseball as “The Catch.”

The Giants and Cardinals are playing Major League Baseball’s opening regular season game at Rickwood venue, the nation’s oldest professional baseball venue. Mays, who was born and raised in Alabama, played in the Negro Leagues with the Birmingham Black Barons. In one way, it is unfortunate that Mays passed away so soon before this game, but in another, it makes Thursday night’s nationally televised contest a fitting homage to baseball legend.

These are some of the last few days’ tributes and recollections of Mays.

From the Associated Press’s Hillel Italie:

Few people were as fortunate to possess all five of the necessary components of a superstar: throwing, speed, fielding, power, and average hitting. Fewer displayed those traits with more joy, whether hitting home runs, racing around the bases with a cap that flew off his head, or chasing down fly balls in center field before capping the effort with his signature basket catch.

“I’m not sure what the hell charisma is,” former Reds slugger Ted Kluszewski reportedly observed, “but I get the feeling it’s Willie Mays,” according to Daniel Brown of The Athletic.

“Willie’s skill on the field and impact off it elevated him to a stature that was larger than life, from his professional debut with the Birmingham Black Barons at age 17 through his 24 All-Star Games to his Hall of Fame induction in 1979,” the executive director of the MLB Players Association, Tony Clark, said in a statement. “His integrity, his dedication to perfection, and a caliber of greatness that transcended generations will be remembered.”

From the San Francisco Chronicle’s John Shea:

Throughout his life, Mays broke down boundaries. He attempted to purchase a house in a posh San Francisco area after the Giants relocated there in 1958, but was turned down due to the color of his skin. He persevered and won the residence. A significant step toward the city integrating all of its neighborhoods and California enacting legislation against housing discrimination, not just for him and his wife but also for the next Black family.

“It was a captivating blend of skills, smarts, and style, spanning the coasts at a time of extraordinary change in the game and the country,” The Athletic’s Tyler Kepner said of Mays.

Ray Ratto, at Defector on Mays: “He was more than just the best player.” Not only was he the most joyous of all the great players, which he was. Not only was he the most extraordinarily gifted player of all the five-tool players who competed during the wealthiest period in the history of the game, but he was also that. He was baseball, everything about it.

This was a few years ago, but several decades after he played, Mays’ renowned strength was on show in a moment from Nelson George’s documentary, “Say Hey, Willie Mays!” According to People Magazine, “During a delightful sequence in the movie, George gives Mays a first-time handshake and winces at how firm his hold is, eliciting laughter from both men.” Mays clearly defines who is the star athlete and who is not, even at the age of 91.

Say hello and rest in peace.