I think there is a good argument to be made that he was the best all around player. Fittingly, I was at a ball game when I learned of his passing.
I would go Ruth 1 and Mays 2, but I would also say Mays was the only player who can seriously be considered besides Ruth for #1.
He was so good for so long. He started playing before I was born and he was still playing when I was 18. He was a simply a part of baseball to me, always there until just now. He was outstanding in so many aspects of the game over all that time, just kept playing and racking up his stat totals. I agree he is greatest all-around baseball player of all time.
Willie, Mickey and the Duke.
My first major league game, sometime around 1969, when I was 8 at Candlestick. I wore by glove hoping for a fly ball the entire game. Tickets were comped by someone in my father’s church 'cause we certainly couldn’t afford them. Willie hit a grand slam home run for the win. Don’t remember anything else about the day or the game. Say hey kid, keep on slugging them.
A great loss to baseball, but a hell of a good run.
As many have noted previously, when you discuss ‘inner circle’ hall of fame baseball players, the list always seems to start with Willie Mays. RIP.
That said, Barry Bonds was the greatest all around player in MLB history.
I was lucky enough to see him play in the 1971 All Star Game in Detroit. Whether he’s #1 all time or not can be argued for eternity but he is easily one of the greatest if not the greatest of all time. Hitting, fielding, running- he had it all. Also seemed to be a classy person.
I’m not someone who dismisses Bonds because of the PEDs - I think Bonds was the most fearsome hitter the game’s ever seen. But I don’t think there was anything special about Bonds’ ability to patrol left field. Mays not only was one of the preeminent hitters in the league, but he played an immaculate center field.
This is one of those impossible arguments, but look at it this way: Bonds was an above average outfielder with more homers, more runs, more walks, more stolen bases, and significantly higher on-base and slugging percentages. I don’t think Mays being a somewhat better defender offsets those accomplishments.
I was a 7-year-old Mets fan when Mays was traded to the Mets in 1972. My curiosity about the new “star” (he was, of course, well past his prime) prompted me to read Willie Mays: Coast to Coast Giant, probably the first grown-up book I ever read.
I’ve read that Candlestick’s in-blowing winds were equally hostile to power hitters.
Candlestick was brutal for right handed hitters. Mays actually had different swings for home and on the road.
“I had two different types of swings. One was, I pulled the ball on the road, and in San Francisco I hit more to right-center,” he said in a 1999 interview. “You can’t hit a home run off a ballpark. You hit it off a pitcher. Of course I lost a lot of home runs [at Candlestick], but I couldn’t worry about that … Winning was more important than hitting a home run to me.”
Candlestick opened in 1960, and the Giants traded Mays to the Mets in 1972. During the years when Candlestick was his home park, he hit 202 homers at home and 194 on the road. If The Stick hurt his home run production, it doesn’t show up in the numbers.
Candlestick did suppress his batting average a bit during those years. It was .295 at home and .315 on the road.
Mays’ lower total of road home runs could be because many of the newer ballparks in the National League during that time (e.g., Dodger Stadium, Shea, and the Astrodome) were hitter-unfriendly.
I saw him in his late seasons. Great player and a good man.
It depends what you mean by “overall player.” I’ve always interpreted that term as being accomplished to a given degree in all relevant skills. Lloyd Moseby was a much better all around player than Willie McCovey, but McCovey is the greater player.
There is little doubt in my mind Mays’ 660 bombs are, in context, as impressive as any post-steroid player, including Barry Bonds.
And Bonds did not have a strong arm. Maybe average or slightly better than average.
Was anyone better than Willie Mays? I just opened a thread for that.
Bet that as it may, I still say .298/.444/.607 182 OPS+ tops .301/.384/.557 155 OPS+, despite Mays being better defensively. And that’s without the counting stats.
Plus, Bonds played in more diverse era (hello Latin America and Japan.)
From a tribute I read this morning:
After Mays made a running catch in the outfield, and then threw out the runner on third who was trying to score, Dodgers manager Charlie Dressen said “He’ll have to do it again for me to believe it.”
Also, Mays started his major-league career by going 1 for his first 26. That one hit? A home run off a guy named Warren Spahn.