PERSPECTIVE: Willie Mays’ place in Black America was complicated, but he advanced civil rights

If we were doing a roll call of the greatest Major League Baseball players of all time, Hall of Famer Willie Mays would be mentioned in that roll call…and you wouldn’t have to wait long to hear his name. Mays, who died on June 18 at the age of 93, was the prototype of what baseball aficionados would call a five-tool player. He could hit for power (660 home runs/.557 slugging percentage), hit for average (.301 batting average, and .394 on-base percentage), had speed in the field and on the basepaths (339 stolen bases), and was a great outfielder (12 Gold Glove awards.) Then-New York Giants center fielder Willie Mays leaps high to snare a ball near the outfield fence at the Giants’ Phoenix, Arizona, spring training base on Feb. 29, 1956. Mays, the electrifying “Say Hey Kid” whose singular combination of talent, drive and exuberance made him one of baseball’s greatest and most beloved players, died on June 18 at age 93. Photo credit: The Associated Press & If you lived in New York at the time when the city had three teams—the Yankees, the Dodgers, and the Giants, he was part of an ongoing debate of who was...