![]() Malcoun said he wasn’t able to get Mays’ autograph when he went to that Giants game in 1962. If Willie Mays was the greatest player to play the game, which he could be, Barry Bonds would be second.” It’s not that I don’t think younger people can appreciate him, but I think the older you are, you appreciate him. “Just to see (Mays’) flash, to see how he played the game. “My father took us to Candlestick Park, but I also went to a couple of games at Seals Stadium when the Giants first came here. Yeah, no doubt about it, and I was old enough to realize what a great player he was,” said Pechner, who now works in guest services at the park. Mays was the main attraction on Giants teams of that era that also featured Willie McCovey, Orlando Cepeda, the Alou brothers and Juan Marichal. Pechner said he used to deliver the Marin Independent-Journal as a kid and if a month went by without any complaints or missed deliveries, he would receive a free ticket to a Friday night game at Candlestick. Mike Pechner, 76, a former on-air meteorologist, notably at KCBS, said he can remember watching Mays when the Giants played at Seals Stadium in 19 after the organization moved to the Bay Area from New York. ![]() (Carlos Avila Gonzalez/San Francisco Chronicle via AP) Willie Mays was quite a player.” San Francisco Giants baseball great Willie Mays smiles as he talks with Giants manager Gabe Kapler while celebrating his 92nd birthday with family and friends at Oracle Park in San Francisco, Calif., Saturday, May 6, 2023. “I’d say it was like watching Barry Bonds play. Just him being on the field was amazing,” Doyle said. “At that time, he was just bigger than life. In 1968, when Mays turned 37, he still had 79 RBIs with a. Giants fan Michael Doyle, 68, of Carmel estimated that he saw Mays play at Candlestick in the late 1960s when his status as one of the game’s greatest players had already been established. “You kind of realize just how normal of a guy he is despite being one of the best baseball players of all time.” Eventually, I worked up the courage to just at least introduce myself and talk to him and he already knew who I was, so I thought that was really cool. “I thought it was just cool that he was there. “I probably didn’t talk to him the first couple of times he came (into the Giants clubhouse) just because I was a young guy and I figured, let the other guys talk to him,” Crawford said. ![]() “Willie is maybe the greatest player that ever lived,” Giants manager Gabe Kapler said. Mays’s career included two National League MVP awards, 12 Gold Gloves, a Rookie of the Year award in 1951, a World Series title in 1954, two All-Star Game MVPs, and ultimately election to the Hall of Fame in 1979. Still, despite retiring close to 50 years ago, the Say Hey Kid’s feats on the baseball diamond are remembered with awe by those who got to see him play in person, particularly during his tenure in San Francisco where he cemented his status as one of the greatest players of all time. Mays, the oldest living member of the Baseball Hall of Fame and the greatest Giants player of all time, turned 92 on Saturday as San Francisco beat the Milwaukee Brewers 4-1. Mays, who played for the Giants from 1951-72, briefly attended the game. ![]() He had speed, he had strength, he could catch the ball, he could run faster than anybody. “He was just a phenomenon beyond his time,” said Malcoun, now 70, said of Mays on Friday at Oracle Park. SAN FRANCISCO – Willie Mays was approaching the midway point of what would be an illustrious 23-year MLB career in 1962 when Steve Malcoun and his Little League team from Stockton got a chance to see him play live on a trip to Candlestick Park.
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