Willie Mays Stats

Did you know that Willie Mays played Major League Baseball for twenty-two seasons and was named to twenty-four All-Star Games? Did you know he was the first player in National League history to join the 30 / 30 Club ( 30 Home Runs and 30 Stolen Bases )?

Willie Mays won twelve consecutive Gold Gloves starting the year the award was first introduced (1957) and up through 1968. Join Baseball Almanac as we take a look at some additional numbers of interest as they relate to the best five-tool player in Major League history:

1 - Willie Mays was the number one ranked center fielder in baseball history by Bill James in The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract . An excerpt from the write-up included this tidbit, "According to Sam Levy of the Milwaukee Journal (Baseball Digest, June, 1955), the Braves began scouting Willie Mays when he was fifteen years old. The Braves head of scouting, Harry Jenkins, watched Mays play many times, and raved about him often - but lost him in a dispute over $2,500 when two of his assistant scouts, sent to cross-check, doubted that Mays was work $10,000. If the Braves had signed him they would have had Mays, Aaron , Mathews and Spahn on the team from 1954 through 1965.

2 - Willie Mays won two Most Valuable Player Awards (1954 & 1965), two All-Star Game Most Valuable Player Awards ( 1963 & 1968 ) and was ranked the second greatest player in Major League history by The Sporting News in their list of the 100 Greatest Baseball Players .

4 - Willie Mays hit four home runs in a game on April 30, 1961 , only the sixth instance in National League history and a record for Most Home Runs in a Game Record that still stands to this day.

13 - Willie Mays in his thirteenth at-bat, May 28, 1951 , (after going hitless in his first twelve at-bats), hit a home run in the first inning over the left field fence in the Polo Grounds for his first big league hit. The pitcher, future Hall of Famer Warren Spahn , quipped, "I'll never forgive myself. We might have gotten rid of Willie forever if I'd only struck him out."

17 - Willie Mays had seventeen 20-home run seasons (1951, 1954-1968 & 1970), eleven 30-home run seasons (1954-1957, 1959 & 1961-1966), six 40-home run seasons (1954, 1955, 1961, 1962, 1964 & 1965), and two 50-home run seasons (1955 & 1965) / review the Most Seasons With XX Home Runs Record Book to see where he ranks in each of these plateaus.

24 - Willie Mays was an All-Star twenty-four times, tied with Hank Aaron and Stan Musial for the most in baseball history, prompting Ted Williams to say, "They invented the All-Star Game for Willie Mays."

660 - Willie Mays finished his career with 660 home runs, third most in big league history (behind Hank Aaron & Babe Ruth ) at the time of his retirement.

1954 - Willie Mays made "The Catch" during the 1954 World Series . An iconic moment in World Series history where Mays made an over-the-shoulder running grab in deep center of the Polo Grounds of a long drive off the bat of Vic Wertz during the eighth inning of Game 1 .

1979 - Willie Mays was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1979, on his first ballot, with 94.7% of the votes. New York Daily News columnist Dick Young wrote about the 23 votes who chose not to enshrine Mays, "If Jesus Christ were to show up with his old baseball glove, some guys wouldn't vote for him. He dropped the cross three times, didn't he?"

Willie Mays | National Baseball Hall of Fame Plaque | Class of 1979 ( HOF )
The Say Hey Kid only won a single batting title, when he hit .345 in 1954, but that same year he also led the National League in slugging percentage (which he led five times), on base percentage (which he led five times) and triples (which he led three times). The following season, Mays won his first home run championship (his first of four), led the league in total bases (which he did three times) and extra base hits (which he did two times). These type of numbers / leaderboard appearances continued on across his career prompting Hall of Famer Leo Durocher - Mays first skipper in the big leagues - to say in Nice Guys Finish Last (Chicago Press, 09/15/2009, Page 385), "If somebody came up and hit .450, stole 100 bases, and performed a miracle in the field every day, I'd still look you right in the eye and tell you that Willie was better. He could do the five things you have to do to be a superstar: hit, hit with power, run, throw and field. And he had the other magic ingredient that turns a superstar into a super-superstar. Charisma."