I watched the movie 61 last night and towards the end the picture depicted him as being in pretty bad shape both emotionally and physically.
I know he died not too long after, so was he already sick from something, or was it just the pressure (the latter seems pretty hard to believe).
Also did the fans dislike him because he was a jerk in real life, or just because they loved Mantel?
Roger Maris didn’t die until 1985. He played baseball until 1968. From what I’ve always understood about the home run chase in 1961, Roger was getting mentally and physically broken down from the pressure.
Mickey Mantle was the Yankee golden boy for 10 years, and the fans and the press really wanted him to get the record. Roger had to put up with bad press, fans booing and even death threats from people who thought he was undeserving of the record.
Roger Maris died of cancer. The only malady he suffered from when he played was stress.
I belive the fans saw Maris as some hick kid who came out of nowhere and started hitting home runs all of a sudden. Mantle had been hitting, most notably in '56, but his injuries kept him from the record. If Mantle been able to hit 61, he probably wouldn’t have to deal with that stupid asterisk. Maris continued to have pretty good seasons in '62, '63 and '64, but even homers in '62 and '63 combined are five short of '61.
Opinions always vary, and we should be wary of accepting any one version of how things were in 1961.
No question, the legend of Roger Maris as victim of the vicious New York media, and cruel New York fans, has become popular, and the HBO movie “61” certainly treated that legend as fact. But most older Yankee fans I know (I was an infant in 1961, so I can’t offer any first-hand opinions) and most New York sportswriters scoff at that notion.
To hear THEM tell it (feel free to taked this with a grain of salt), Maris was a delight to deal with… in 1961, that is. And most reporters treated him just fine… in 1961, that is. It was in 1962 that Maris’ relations with fans and the press went South. Maris had a major falling out with New York’s most prominent sportswriter, Jimmy Cannon during the Spring of 1962, and pretty much shunned the press after that. It was THEN that the press turned against Maris, NOT while he was chasing Babe Ruth.
Here’s a question for those who think the press was unfair toward Maris, and that they favored Mickey Mantle: In 1960, both Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle had great seasons (Maris led the AL in RBIs, Mantrle led the league in homers). If sportswriters REALLY loved Mantle and loathed Maris, why did those same sportswriters give the 1960 MVP award to Roger Maris???
I never knew Roger Maris or Jimmy Cannon, so I won’t try to judge who was right or wrong. But it’s obvious to me that the image of Saint Roger being unfairly crucified by demonic reporters just doesn’t wash.
I was just reading the “Current Biography” profile of Roger Maris from 1961.
He is described by past managers and teammates as “opinionated”, “stubborn”, “intelligent”, “a brooder”
It goes on to say that Maris was prone to sulking during slumps.
To me, he seems a bit like a less talkative version of Paul O’Neill.
It should be noted that despite the allegedly bad press Maris received, those same sportswriters named him the American League Most Valuable Player in 1961, albiet by a very small margin, DESPITE the fact that Mantle was actually the better player, even with seven fewer homers. Consider that Mark McGwire did not win the MVP Award the year he hit 70. And it was the second year in a row Maris won the award.
So Maris did, in fact, enjoy decent treatment from the press in 1961. He was certainly under a lot of pressure, just by virtue of the record he was chasing.