Willie Mays, the baseball icon who passed away on Tuesday at the age of 93, urged people to "shut up!" "Please stop talking!"
In a Pittsburgh hotel room during the summer of 1964, Willie Mays had gathered all of the Black and Latino players on the San Francisco Giants. Their manager, Alvin Dark, was cited in a newspaper editorial for making racial remarks regarding their lack of intelligence and cultural sophistication. Star Orlando Cepeda was among Mays' teammates who were threatening to skip games. They want Dark's dismissal.
Mays put an end to the rebellion. First of all, he clarified, Dark will most likely be fired by the Giants at the end of the season. Secondly, losing the manager in the middle of the season would hurt their chances of winning the pennant. Ultimately, Dark would eventually be dismissed and would be asked, "why did you quit on your manager," "everywhere you go, some son of a bitch with a microphone or a camera or a pad and pencil."
When Dark named Mays team captain early in the season, Mays reminded his teammates that the manager had been accused by the media of ducking another contentious interview on his opinions on race. Mays was now in a difficult situation: although his standing should have given him the leadership, some may argue that his race—Blackness—was a factor in his selection. That bitter experience influenced how he handled this problem.
Mays warned his colleagues, "Don't let the rednecks make a hero out of him."
The incident was a reflection of his burdens. Mays, unlike Jackie Robinson, was not a crusader, but he was a member of the pioneer group of Black ballplayers that followed Robinson into Major League Baseball. Despite his attempts to avoid politics, he was a Black athlete competing during the civil rights period. Like it or not, he was thrown into a racial dispute.
Mays started his professional career in the Negro Leagues with the Birmingham Black Barons after growing up in segregated Alabama. Baseball fans were in awe of his powerful and graceful running, catching, and throwing abilities when he signed with the New York Giants in 1951. Rookie of the Year went to him quickly. He led the Giants to a World Series championship in 1954 and was awarded Most Valuable Player, a feat made possible by a legendary over-the-shoulder grab in Game One.
Despite the fact that Mays brought a sense of coolness to big league baseball, as seen by his deft "basket catch" of fly balls, the media showed paternal fondness for him. Jimmy Cannon, a columnist, referred to him as a "joyous boy." "Say Hey Kid" was his moniker. Black rage, power, aggression, and sexuality-related fears were allayed by this picture of a wide-eyed innocence. Mays made it simple for white supporters to applaud a Black sportsman.
However, Mays was not immune to the stigmas and discrimination that Black Americans faced in the 1950s, despite his widespread popularity. Readers took issue with him early in his career, for instance, when he was shown caressing the white actress Laraine Day on a Sports Illustrated cover. In 1958, when the Giants relocated to ostensibly liberal San Francisco, he found it difficult to get a home in a mostly white area.
Then, in 1964, Dark said to Newsday's Stan Isaacs, "We have trouble because we have so many Negro and Spanish-speaking players on this team." In terms of mental awareness, they just cannot match the white ball player's performance. "You can't make most Negro and Spanish players have the pride in their team that you can get from White players," he said, but he saw Mays as an exception.
Mays was not playing the part of a flunky for his white boss by putting a stop to the agitation among the enraged Giants. Instead, he was a pragmatic and a professional. He made an effort to control the circumstances in order to protect everyone's interests, including his own.
But as the narrative progressed, it became clear how the media influenced discussions around racial issues in sports. In the process, Mays was taken advantage of.
The Giants' two-game series against the Mets in early August marked the height of the Dark debate. There were rumors that the white manager who was born in Louisiana would be fired by the Giants. However, the majority of sportswriters who backed Dark cited his track record of starting players who were Black and Latino. They said that Isaacs had misquoted him. Isaacs's defense was limited to Black authors and a handful of young, leftist White reporters.
At a news conference at Shea Stadium, Dark emphasized his egalitarianism and highlighted how he elevated Mays to captain. next a private team meeting the next day, he gave Mays the lineup card; however, Mays was suffering from a bad cold and was going to take it easy. However, by staying silent, Mays ran the prospect of the media claiming that he had sealed the manager's fate. He thereby marked his place in the lineup.
According to Joe Reichler, an Associated Press writer who was sympathetic to Dark, Mays said, "I'm only playing to help the manager; I shouldn't be." It's amazing that he hit two home runs. "Mays Backs Dark with Two Homers," "Mays Backs up Giant Skipper," and "Mays: A Vote for Dark" were headlines that ran.
If it was true, Mays was questioned by other sportswriters. Did he play to give Dark a boost? "I refuse to respond to that," the famous person said. He said, "I never said anything like that," in front of fewer writers after having a shower.
Mays really refused to play any part assigned by the media, be it activist crusader or rescuer of the management. "Who do you think I'm trying to impress, one writer?" he inquired. "Me," he said, tapping himself on the breast. It wasn't self-serving on his part. He pursued the route that would have brought him financial gain, team success, and professional recognition—the rights that any professional athlete, regardless of race, would have. However, he was aware that Black athletes had distinct expectations, and while this infuriated him, it also contributed to a perspective of accepted reality.
Mays thought Dark would make it through the season. Then, after a fourth-place finish, the Giants dismissed the manager, just as he had prophesied. However, Mays was angry at how Dark, working with the media, had taken advantage of his actions and remarks. He didn't say anything to his management the remainder of the 1964 season.
Mays had accumulated incredible numbers by the time he left professional baseball in 1973: 660 home runs, 1909 RBIs, and a career batting average of.301. Even at the end of his career, he continued to arouse nostalgia among authors and fans as they remembered him gliding with enthusiasm and a grin over center field at the Polo Grounds.
But the actual Willie Mays was more nuanced, as the Dark affair showed. As his demeanor changed and press standards shifted, more sportswriters began to describe him as defensive and grumpy by the late 1960s and early 1970s. Black detractors of Mays at this time, like as Jackie Robinson, criticized her for being silent in the face of racial injustice.
But the celebrity refrained from expressing his emotions in public. His goal was to create goodwill in order to more subtly close the racial divide in America. The Dark controversy exposed the benefits and drawbacks of that strategy: while he defused a PR bomb, it lost him control of the story about his racist boss.
It was expected and justified that Mays's passing on June 18 would lead to homages to one of baseball's greatest players ever. However, it's important to recognize how the media used him to convey a narrative about racism in America, even as we celebrate his extraordinary career. Mays had a tale of his own.
At the University of Memphis, Aram Goudsouzian holds the Bizot Family Professor of History title. He wrote a comprehensive examination of the Alvin Dark debate that was published in Journalism History's June 2024 edition.
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