Willie Mays stood 5’10 and weighed 170 pounds, but he etched himself into baseball lore as a giant not only because of the team he played for but for being one of the greatest players ever to step foot on a baseball field.
Rookie of the Year, a batting title, 24 All-Star Game selections, 12 Gold Gloves, two MVPs, Major League Player of the Year, World Series Champion, and, of course, Hall of Famer. Few have accomplished even a fraction of the hardware that the Say Hey Kid earned throughout his career. His career is one that stat nerds like myself love to dig through on Baseball-Reference and Stathead to truly admire his greatness.
Mays got his first taste of professional baseball in 1948 as a 17-year-old playing in the Negro Leagues for the Birmingham Black Barons. He was limited to just 13 games played as he split time in left field with another youngster, 24-year-old Jim Zapp. In those 13 games, Mays hit just .233 with a .638 OPS in 48 plate appearances.
Then on June 20, 1950, Mays signed as an amateur free agent with the New York Giants at the age of 20. His minor league career was brief. Mays hit .353 with a .947 OPS in 81 games that year. That earned him a promotion to AAA the following season where he torched the league and hit .477 with a 1.323 OPS and got the call to the major leagues after 35 games.
After the callup, Mays went on to hit .274 with a .828 OPS and slugged 20 homers in 121 games, earning himself the 1951 National League Rookie of the Year. In 1952, Mays was drafted to serve in the Korean War with the U.S. Army after only playing 34 games. After his service, he returned to the Giants in 1954. Upon his return to baseball, Mays started his ascent as one of the game’s greatest players.
The 1954 campaign was Mays’ first full season in the majors, and he exploded for 41 home runs and led all of baseball with a .345 batting average to win his one and only batting title and also led the league with a .667 slugging percentage. His 13 triples and 1.078 OPS also lead the National League. Mays had officially burst onto the scene, and 1954 was the start of 13 years of pure dominance. From 1954 to 1966, Mays never played less than 151 games in a season and hit .315 with a .992 OPS while clobbering 518 home runs. He averaged 40 homers and 21 stolen bases a year in that span. He eclipsed the 50-home-run mark twice, with 51 in 1955 and 52 in 1965.
Mays was one of the most consistent hitters of all time. The year-to-year stats already prove that, but the situation in the game did not matter either; Mays was still going to produce. In his career, Mays hit .308 with a .977 OPS, with runners in scoring position. Per Baseball Reference’s leverage index, Mays hit .296 with a .936 OPS in low-leverage situations, .301 with a .935 OPS in medium-leverage situations, and .313 with a .965 OPS in high-leverage situations. As the moment got bigger throughout the game, so did Mays.
Black ink riddles Mays’ Baseball Reference page, signifying he led the league in those statistics. He led the National League in runs twice, hits once, triples three times, home runs four times, stolen bases four times (all in a row), walks once, batting average once, on-base percentage twice, slugging percentage five times, OPS five times, OPS+ six times and total bases three times. He led all of baseball in hits once, triples twice, homers three times, stolen bases three times, batting average once, slugging percentage four times, OPS twice, OPS+ once, and total bases three times.
Looking at Stathead makes his career seem even more marvelous. Mays’ two 30/30 seasons make him one of 14 players in baseball history to have multiple 30/30 seasons (30 home runs and 30 stolen bases). In 1955, Mays became the first player in baseball history to have 50+ home runs and 20+ stolen bases in a season (51/24), and since then, only Brady Anderson in 1996, Ken Griffey Jr. in 1998, and Alex Rodriguez in 2007 have joined that list. Also, in 1955, Mays became the first player ever to lead the majors in triples and home runs, with 51 home runs and 13 triples. Jim Rice, in 1978, was the only other player ever to complete that feat. Mays is also one of three players in baseball history with 600+ home runs and 300+ stolen bases, with Barry Bonds and Alex Rodriguez being the others. He is one of four players with 3,000+ hits and 600+ home runs, with Hank Aaron, Albert Pujols, and Alex Rodriguez. Mays and Babe Ruth are the only players with 600+ home runs, 500+ doubles, and 100+ triples in their careers.
Then comes the Wins Above Replacement. Mays finished his illustrious career with 156.2 bWAR, third all-time behind Barry Bonds and Babe Ruth. He led the league in bWAR ten times in his career and has six seasons with 10+ bWAR, which is tied for second-most in baseball history with Rogers Hornsby and only trails Babe Ruth, who has nine. He is also fourth all-time in dWAR (defensive Wins Above Replacement) among outfielders with 18.2.
The power, speed, consistency, and defensive prowess have firmly placed Mays into the “greatest of all time” conversation with a compelling case. The baseball world has lost a legend. Rest in peace, Willie Mays.
