Customer Reviews

Willie Mays: The Life, The Legend

5 star:		(69)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

A local store has had this wonderful baseball history for sale for over a week, and I've been able to enjoy reading it and re-reading favorite portions with increasing pleasure. Hirsch writes in a clear, informative style and has clearly done a great deal of research. Amazon has provided generous extracts, which give the reader a very good flavor of how well written and interesting this book really is.

This is the first well researched, major biography of Willie Mays, a state of affairs brilliantly rectified in Hirsch's work. Mays himself prevented the publication of an authorized biography; it took seven years of Hirsch's effort to win Mays's confidence. Under their agreement, Mays will get half of the book's proceeds (much of which will go to the Say Hey Foundation.)

Although Mays is not listed as a co-author, he provided Hirsch with interviews, introduced him to people in his life, even people from his Alabama childhood, and shared his personal archives. Nevertheless, Hirsch insists that Mays did not interfere with his opinions.

As a Yankee fan, I loved baseball more and followed many of the great players over the past 60 years, including following Mays in New York, later in San Francisco and finally with the Mets.

In brief summary, he came up to the major leagues with the New York Giants in 1951 when he was 20. He had begun playing professional baseball in high school in the Negro Leagues; Hirsch writes that Mays learned the importance of entertaining fans as well as playing the game in those early days with the Barons. One trick that created a sort of signature Mays photograph -- he wore caps one size too large for his head so it would often fly off as he ran the bases or ran down a long fly ball.

After leaving the Barons, he played Triple-A ball in Minneapolis; after 35 games he was hitting .477, had eight home runs, 30 RBIs and eight stolen bases. Leo Durocher, the manager of the Giants, made him his starting centerfielder. The New York papers couldn't get enough on him; gallons of ink were used to extol his presence on the Giants.

There was a similar outpouring when the Giants arrived in San Francisco: "In the financial district, ticker tape, torn telephone books, and papers were thrown from office buildings. Cable cars clanged, horns blared. Some streetcars were rocked, and trolleys were pulled off wires. Market Street was jammed until long past midnight."

There is much to love in this book, many stories about Mays' intelligence: how he would fake a limp or slow down when running the bases to confuse the infielders; how deeply he studied opposing players and members of his own team, how well he could anticipate the opposition.

This is a wonderfully quotable book; one example will suffice given Amazon's generosity in providing extracts:

"Willie Mays's rookie year would not be his finest or the year of his greatest celebrity, but it was his sunburst, creating a perception of athleticism, innocence, and joy that would shape the public's view for years."

The book glories in the triumphs, but does not spare the hard times. Mays had marriage problems and money problems, and racial problems, not only with fans but with other, more active Civil Rights advocates. There were tensions between Mays and Robinson, for example, and by the end of the 1960s Mays was not part of the Civil Rights movement in any public manner.

"He was an authority figure when opposing authority was celebrated. He was a man of deference at a time of defiance."

A sub-theme of this biography is the story of how America and baseball came to grip with racial issues.

Like too many athletes, Mays did not leave baseball gracefully. I watched his sad tenure with the Mets, an "improbable return, awash in remembrance and renewal."

At the same time, my memories of Mays will last my lifetime. Hirsch writes 31 paragraphs describing "The Catch" -- the fantastic catch of Vic Wertz's long ball to left in the 1954 World Series -- and his dead-on throw back to the infield.

Cleveland players insisted at the time that Mays made the catch look more difficult than it really was -- shades of his early training with the Barons -- both Mays and the Indians were more impressed with his throw back to the infield, which froze Larry Doby at third. I often drive past a ball field dedicated to Larry Doby in Paterson; every time I pass the field, I remember that moment of World Series history.

This excellent book enhanced that memory and so many more. It is a worthy tribute to one of the greatest ball players of all time.

Robert C. Ross 2010

This is more than a baseball book. It is a history of Jim Crow America from the 20's through the 60's. For those who have no experience, memory or knowledge of a segregated America, this book will be quite an eye opener. In addition, Willie Mays is someone who little has been written about, other than his great baseball talent. He helped open the gates for a quota free desegregation of baseball. And he did it his way: with a smile on his face and the thickest of skin. Bravo to James Hirsch for a well-written and sell-researched book.

He does so in this book.

I feel a bit of sadness about Willie, having read this book, the same sadness I had as a 9-year-old in 1973, watching him stumble when rounding second, trying to go from first to third on a single, in the 1973 World Series, and having to crawl back to second.

Whether due more to innate personality tendencies, his own reactions to segregation in his native Alabama in general, or associated with baseball, his family of origin, or a combination of this and more, it's sad that he doesn't open up even more.

And while I, being Caucasian, am in no position to judge Willie on his activism in civil rights, and agree with him that we don't all have the same temperament, Hirsch does show how Robinson and Aaron could wish so hard for more from him and be frustrated he didn't give that.

But, Mays ultimately lived for baseball above all else. And Hirsch shows that, too.

Speaking of that, I'm sure Bowie Kuhn's ban on Mays' associating with baseball while doing casino work had to kill him. Something else it would have been nice to have him open up more about.

But, the not opening up is itself part of Mays. Hirsch also does a good job of showing how Mays, in his own quiet way, refuted or rejected various stereotypes.

A good sports bio.

The first thing that I feel is beneficial to point out to all potential readers is that it doesn't matter who your favorite team is... if you're an old school baseball fan you will absolutely love this book! The author covers in excruciatingly tantalizing detail the world of baseball in the 1940's... 50's... 60's... and 70's. This is the time period that has lovingly been described as both the "GOLDEN-AGE-OF-BASEBALL"... and also been blessed with the poetic ribbon of admiration as the period when "BASEBALL-WAS-STILL-A-GAME!" And no one before or since played with such youthful uninhibited exuberance as Willie "THE-SAY-HEY-KID" Mays. The author leads you from Willie's childhood days in Birmingham Alabama and sheds an informative affectionate light on Willie's Father Cat Mays who was also a good ballplayer and also the young woman... actually just a young girl... his thirteen-year-old Aunt Sarah who was the main female/mother presence in his daily life. Young Willie was so talented that he played professional baseball when he was fifteen-years-old thus giving up his high school baseball eligibility. Willie played in the final years of the Negro League and of course he idolized Jackie Robinson. His favorite player was Joe DiMaggio and Joltin' Joe is who he patterned his batting stance after. He also enjoyed following Stan Musial and Ted Williams. When Willie was ten-years-old he even told people to call him "DiMag".

When he signed with the New York Giants he had a meteoric rise through the minors and when the Giants promoted him from Minneapolis to New York the fans loved him so much in Minneapolis the Giants owner placed an ad in the Minneapolis paper apologizing for taking Willie away from them. Where this intensely dogged story explodes into an even higher gear (in this old-school-fanatics opinion) is when he gets to New York and plays for the man who would become his mentor... protector... Father figure... and PR staff... the inimitable Leo "THE LIP" Durocher. No stone is left unturned and none of the course language on the field and in the locker room is spared. Having been a fan of Durocher from his Dodger days I had to laugh and acknowledge the authenticity of "The-LIP'S" words when after Willie started his big league career off with an 0 for 12 slump at the plate... and then got his first hit... a home run off of future Hall Of Fame pitcher Warren Spahn... Durocher was quoted as saying: "I NEVER SAW A *darn* BALL LEAVE A *darn* PARK SO *darn* FAST IN MY *darn* LIFE." "The savior had arrived."

Another refreshing ability in the author's work is that he does not hesitate for a second in sharing Willie's weaknesses as well as his Superman like strengths. When documenting the famous comeback in the 1951 pennant chase when the Giants overcame the Dodgers "insurmountable" lead to force a 2 out of 3 playoff series... which of course led to Bobby Thompson's "SHOT HEARD ROUND THE WORLD" that won the pennant... it so happened that Mays was on deck. Willie admits to praying while he was on deck: "PLEASE DON'T LET IT BE ME. DON'T MAKE ME COME TO BAT NOW, G-D." This surprising weakness in Mays's self-confidence became pivotal in Mays future. "HE WAS EMBARRASSED BY HIS TIMIDITY, ASHAMED THAT HE DID NOT WANT TO BE THE MAN AT THE PLATE WITH THE GAME ON THE LINE. HE WAS DETERMINED TO CHANGE THAT."

This book has encyclopedic power as it delivers FIVE-HUNDRED-SIXTY-SIX-PAGES of hypnotic information ranging from Willie battling Hall Of Famer centerfielders Duke Snider of the Brooklyn Dodgers and Mickey Mantle of the New York Yankees for supremacy of a city... let alone the world. And the magical 1954 World Series which of course included one of the greatest catches in the history of baseball... and is the last time the Giants whether in New York or San Francisco ever won a world championship. It also includes Willie going in the Army despite his trying to... and failing to get out through legal challenges. Again the author and Willie pull no punches when they write: "BUT TO HIS CREDIT HE NEVER EXAGGERATED HIS MILITARY SERVICE OR MADE HIMSELF OUT TO BE A FALSE HERO. AS HE SAID IN AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY, I HAVE NO PRIDE IN MY ARMY CAREER, BUT I HAVE NO APOLOGIES FOR IT EITHER. I DID WHAT THE MAN SAID." Like I said a beautifully documented *true*-life story. There are also SIXTY-FIVE PAGES OF ACKNOWLEDGMENTS... NOTES... BIBLIOGRAPHY... and INDEX. It's all here including the heated hatred-fueled rivalry between the Dodgers and Giants (It should be noted that Willie was one player who the Dodger fans applauded at Ebbets Field)... to Willie's reaching the pinnacle of national success and adoration which ranged from national magazine covers to actress Tallulah Bankhead stating: "THERE HAVE BEEN TWO GENIUSES, WILLIE MAYS AND WILLIE SHAKESPEARE." And of course there was the decline of the once great Mays as he stayed too long and finished his career with the Mets. Note: The author made a historical statistical mistake on page 189 when he said Willie finished second in the league in home runs behind Gil Hodges in 1954. Actually Willie was third. "Big" Ted Kluszewski of the Cincinnati Reds led the league with forty-nine home runs... Hodges was second with forty-two... and Willie was third with forty-one.

You won't be able to read this SIX-HUNDRED-PAGE-BOOK in one sitting... but you'll be glad you can't... because every page is a gift to true baseball fans.

I just read Jane Leavy's great Mickey Mantle biography, The Last Boy. For many reasons I had to contrast it with an earlier authorized biography, Willie Mays: The Life, the Legend by James Hirsch. Where Leavy's work was a masterpiece, Hirsch's book was pedestrian. This leads me to analyze Mays, his life and his persona in more in-depth manner than, well, Hirsch did. Hirsch should not be faulted entirely. In getting Willie's cooperation, he shut off much of the Mays story; basically, the bad stuff. Leavy was not inhibited by such a thing. Her subject is dead, and besides, he never hid his numerous faults.

This is a strange conundrum. By traditional standards of morality, Mays is the "better" guy. He was sober, apparently faithful to his wive(s), and by all accounts a Christian from the Bible Belt. Mantle was a drunk, a womanizer and only at the every end (which is certainly better than nothing) did he realize he was accountable to God.

But Mick was real. Mays was, well, not a bad guy, but no prince among men, either. I have personal experience with him and found him unimpressive. There is something vaguely wrong with the fellow. Start with longtime San Francisco media personality Gary Radnich, who used to specialize in receiving callers with "Mays stories," which detailed his rudeness to fans asking for autographs on planes and public places, often infused by foul language. Mantle was just as bad.

Then there was the time I, a sports columnist for the San Francisco Examiner, approached the sainted Willie at Pacific Bell Park the night Barry Bonds hit his 500th homer. My theme was to compare Bonds's good crowd reception with the way Boston warmed up to Ted Williams after Korea, New York to Mantle in 1961, and San Francisco to Mays in 1962 (after worshipping at the altar of the homegrown Joe DiMaggio).

Mays bristled, stating "You can't compare Joe to me." He listed Joe D.'s stats compared to his, and gave very detailed analysis of how he, Willie Mays, was so much better than Joe DiMaggio that, well, the "comparison" could not even be made. Now, Willie Mays may have been better than DiMaggio (although in 1969 Joe D. was voted the Greatest Living Ballplayer), but do not tell me there is no comparison. As with Mantle, DiMaggio played on World Championship teams, performing heroics and miracles in the greatest of spotlights. Fair to Willie or not, this elevates both DiMaggio and Mantle beyond the normal career staistiscs that otherwise might favor Willie. Either way, there is most definitely a "comparison."

I interviewed Willie McCovey that same night and he was totally lacking grace when asked whether Tom Seaver might have deserved the 1969 MVP award he was hosed out of by two writers who failed to list him among their top 10 votes because pitchers already had the Cy Young. My column was titled, "No Humility Here."

But the Mays persona was a thread that started much earlier. In 1979 I attended one of numerous Willie Mays Days hosted by the Giants. My pal Howard Gibian and I looked at each other dumbfounded while Mays made a bitter speech that sounded like Ruben "Hurricane" Carter excoriating the system for wrongfully imprisoning him. Two years later I was invited to a banquet in Reno, Nevada featuring Willie as the keynote speaker. He was the only black man in the room, as I recall. This was the theme. For some 30 or 40 minutes, Willie stood at that podium and lectured whitey for his racist ways. Not a word about "the Catch," what Koufax's curveball looked like up close, the intensity of the Dodger-Giant rivalry, his relationship with "Mista Leo" Durocher, or much of anything else. Instead, we we got detailed descriptions of the KKK, Birmingham, Alabama, circa 1948. The foul acts of white men toward black men in Southern towns was the highlight and lowlight of the speech. He finally concluded to tepid applause and we all departed, supposedly ashamed but rather confused.

As I contemplated the speech, it occurred to me that since I am a white man who is not a racist, this explained why I was not ashamed that other white men were. Then something else occurred to me. Mays described something that sounded like Soviet gulags or the Holocaust. How, I thought, could Willie Mays, against all odds, achieve success, fame, fortune, greatness . . . in America? What odds did he overcome? With white-hooded evil men stopping him behind every corner, yet he somehow still got to the big leagues, hit 660 homers, and forged arguably the best career ever.

Well, Willie achieved this the same way black jazz artists of the 1920s achieved fame and fortune . . . in America. Against all odds or in part because many white folk of good conscience did in fact support them. The same way Joe Louis earned $360,000 in racist America in 1938, then blamed racism in racist America for his failure to write a check and mail it to the IRS like any other tax payer, only to discover the IRS has a way of coming after such people. The way Jackie Robinson made $100,000 in speaking fees in the off-season of 1947-48, mostly from "racist" white Americans who in fact supportred him, mostly through Chrisrtian righteousness (Robinson gained so much weight on the banquet circuit he came to Spring Training out of shape in 1948, ultimately costing Brooklyn the pennant).

Which brings me to Hirsch's book. Race was, is and apparently always will be the defining characteristic of Willie Mays. Sure, whites want to sweep a lot of their old sins under the rug, but do whites get any credit? Is America a "racist country?" Of course it is not. If it was, Michael Jordan would not be a hero, Barack Obama would not be President. If it was, blacks would have had as much chance to succeed as the Chinese dissidents nobody ever hears about who are killed or made to wallow in Communist prison camps, or murdered by African dictators, or any of a million horrors that happen in places that are not like this beautiful America we are so privileged to live in. Think about this: who are the 100 most famous, successful black people of all time? After Nelson Mandela, the other 99 (give or take) are all American citizens. Think Barack Obama, Colin Powell, Booker T. Washington, Willie Mays . . . you get the point. What a miracle! In racist America.

Back to the book. Hirsch is a good enough author. He is also prominently identified as a civil rights chronicler. Not a sportswriter, or a historian like David Halberstam. This is it in a nutshell. The Willie May story is a civil rights saga. Baseball is somewhat secondary. So what? This somehow places the white fans just a little bit on the defensive. We are not allowed to just love Willie, to admire his greatness, to argue the merits of his career with Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio. No, his story is like an Obama speech, a lecture. Well, as my conversation with Mays in 2001 demonstrated, to "compare" St. Willie with white superstars is to touch on the narrow ledge of racism. You cannot "compare" Ruth or DiMaggio to Mays. They competed only against whites. Shut the door to that nasty concept. Baseball only "started" in 1947, apparently. In the American League it "started" even later, a country club Republican league dominated by the Yankees and Tom Yawkey's racist Red Sox.

Whites are supposed to take a sort of back seat, to sit aside and let Willie make race the dominant theme of America in the 80 years he has fought so valiantly against all the odds thrown against him while he gaily played games and made a beautiful living and absorbed adoration and fended off lilly-white autograph seekers. Gimme a break.

I do not blame Hirsch. He no doubt had to follow Willie's direction, his over riding theme. In truth, it would not merely be impossible, but impolitic to write of Mays's life without making race a large measure of the story. Jane Leavy or Laura Hillenbrand would surely have done so, but if allowed to work free of Mays's cumbersome "authorization," no doubt their take would have been different. But pose this question, if you will. Who has a better chance to succeed in racist America, Willie Mays born near "brutal Birmingham" in 1931, or a black child born in drugg-addled Compton in 2011? It takes political correctness bordering on a pure lie to say the kid born in Compton, in the shadow of the Bloods and Crips wars, has a better chance than Mays, who was born into a two-parent household and raised in a Baptist church on Sundays (when his old man was not starring in the industrial league).

But Hirsch faced further difficulty. I'll just come out and say it. Mays is boring. I wanted to get ambience, first the New York swank of the Sinatra `50s, which Leavy delivered in spades in The Last Boy, then a cultured glimpse of San Francisco sophistication in the 1960s. But Mays never was part of either, so we never get this theme. It lacks. He did not drink, smoke, party. He was not part of the scene. A bio of McCovery or Orlando Cepeda may have been far livelier, as they were men about town, bon vivantes. Willie just collected his three hits, a homer, two RBIs, running catch, perfect relay to nab a man at third, then went home to play checkers.

Eventually Willie taught his Godson, Barry Bonds, to blame all his detractors and those who discovered the facts of his steroid use on racism. Typical (YouTube his dugout-lecture-with-son-as-prop during Spring Training a few years back).

I'll take Jackie Robinson or Hank Aaron six days of the weeks and twice on Sundays. And you can compare Joe D. to Willie Mays!

While we all know Willie Mays is one of the best baseball players ever, Mr. Hirsch also wrote one of the best biographers ever too. Mr. Hirsch captures the reader's attention and never let's go. The book includes details of baseball while also capturing personal moments. After reading the book, I have a greater appreciation of Willie Mays and others who played during his time. This book is not just for baseball fans, it is for all those can appreciate a story about someone who worked their way to the top of their profession.

I was one of those kids of the late 50s and early 60s fortunate to grow up in the Bay Area, old enough to be a Giants fan, and lucky enough to have a dad who took me to several games at Candlestick. So I got to see Mays in action numerous times, as well as his amazing teammates of that era: Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal, Orlando Cepeda, Jim Davenport, et al. My dad and I even got to sit in a third base box for the sixth game of the 1962 World Series. I was in heaven, especially when the Giants won.

I was one of those who grew up and into my adulthood thinking that Willie Mays was the best ballplayer of all time. This book confirms that. Now I know for sure that he was. Not only was a genuine, all-around, complete ballplayer, but he was a gentleman, modest, and a very kind man. He was and still is my hero. God Bless Willie Mays. And God Bless James Hirsch for writing this wonderful biography.

Willie Mays had a long and record setting career. His life and his presence on the ball field are complex and involved. Happily, James S. Hirsch has been able to capture this in his book, "Willie Mays: The Life, The Legend."

Writing about a legend is no small task--as the 640 pages of this book bears out. In fact, reading about a legend can be equally consuming. Much like, Stephen E. Ambrose's "Nothing Like It in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad, 1863-1869", this is a well researched and engaging book. However, also like Ambrose's book, this is not a book that you can casually pick up and read over a weekend. You have to devote time and energy into following the picture of Willie Mays that Hirsch weaves throughout the pages of this book. But I can assure you that, if you are interested in baseball and have followed the unique career of Willie Mays, this book will not disappoint. So go ahead and dig in. It's a long journey to the last page, but a totally enjoyable one filled with fascinating insights about one of baseball's premier players.

When I received this hefty tome I have to say I was impressed by just how many pages had been written on one of the greatest baseball players I've heard talked about, but as I tried to read through the book I started coming to the conclusion that much like movies that have had scenes cut for time, this book could probably use more editing to give it a tighter focus and more brevity.

There's nothing wrong with giving multiple examples in support of a point, but after a while readers, like viewers of TV shows or movies, get bored with seeing the same thing written just slightly differently. (See for a fine example of this, a film that I do like, but most others look at and call a bloated film that is far too repetitive: Jackie Brown (Two-Disc Collector's Edition)) If a film, book, TV show episode, whatever doesn't stay focused it loses its audience and then will struggle to get them back. That struggle is part of why it's taken me so long to write a review of this book. I want to heap praise on it, but yet I can't quite do that. It is a very thorough book, the definitive book on Willie Mays certainly, but it isn't a great book. More editing and a sharper and more condensed focus would have helped for sure.

If you'd like to learn more about Willie Mays then by all means read this book, but if you'd like to do it without possibly boring yourself or being overwhelmed by the volume of material here then you may have to hold out hope someone takes this book and uses it as the basis of a biopic. (Something along the lines of what we got with the great biopic Ray (Widescreen Edition) or another similar film, Walk the Line. Heck, if you want to stay in the sports genre, then try something like the very fine film, The Express) Willie Mays certainly deserves such treatment, and I'd like to think an entertaining film could come of something like this biography, but perhaps Mays' life story isn't as appealing to a broad audience as I assume he would be.

I know Mays's numbers pretty well, so Hirsch's point that you couldn't really appreciate Mays by his numbers alone spoke to me and I did learn quite a bit from the book.

-- The Arm: Hirsch emphasizes Mays's great arm and his many spectacular assists and double-plays from the outfield. I was surprised that I hadn't heard more about that before: I had assumed that the Golden Gloves were for catches. Throwing is also something that the most commonly cited statistics don't reflect.

-- Hard Work: Mays's having to fight through slumps and periods of serious exhaustion was admirable.

-- Positioning: Mays's hard work on positioning in the outfield was an eye-opener.

-- Shyness: Hirsch portrays Mays as sticking to baseball to the exclusion of practically everything else and being modest and reticent about most other things in life.

-- Team Player: Mays's outstanding role in supporting or guiding his team-mates was new and interesting to me.

-- Family Background: Hirsch seems to treat Mays's family background with revealing objectivity, making it interesting without romanticizing anything.

One comment kept popping to mind at various times as I was reading: in the frequent comparisons with other all-time great players, Honus Wagner's name never comes up. Wagner is no secret: he was the National League's best hitter for average and for power, best baserunner, and at shortstop best defensive player for a long era. He played with championship teams and I have never heard that he was hard to deal with (unless you were trying to beat the Pirates). As Hirsch notes, Wagner was a charter member of the Hall of Fame, being picked in preference to Speaker, Alexander, and others. If you were choosing up sides, you wouldn't go far wrong picking Wagner first. It seems to me that as Hirsch was putting Joe DiMaggio on his short list he could have mentioned Hans Wagner too.