Among my favorite childhood memories was listening to my dad and my uncles talk about baseball in New York early in the 1950s, when the three starting center fielders among the three local teams — before the Dodgers and Giants bolted for the West Coast, that is — in future Hall of Famers Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle and Duke Snider.
My dad grew up in Brooklyn as a Dodgers fan, but he always said the best two ballplayers in his lifetime played for the other teams: Mays and, years earlier, Joe DiMaggio.
Mays, who died Tuesday at 93, might have been the best two-way player of all-time — a 12-time Gold Glove center fielder with the Giants who belted 660 home runs and led the National League in stolen bases four times.
Born in 1968, the first World Series I vividly recall watching with my father was in 1973, when a 41-year-old Mays played out his career with the Mets in their seven-game loss to the A’s.
