Baker grateful that he visited Mays the day before the Giants icon’s death originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
As the sports world mourns the death of Willie Mays, Dusty Baker reflected on his last visit with the Giants legend just a day earlier.
In an exclusive conversation with USA Today’s Bob Nightengale, Baker explained why he decided to visit his good friend Mays at his Bay Area home on Monday, the day before the Baseball Hall of Famer’s death.
“There was just something telling me to go to him,” Baker told Nightengale. ‘My father always told me: if you think about someone, don’t put it off. You don’t know if you’ll see them again. Well, I went to him, and thank God I did.”
Baker, now a front-office manager at San Francisco, managed the Giants for nine seasons from 1993 to 2002 and developed a close relationship with Mays. The old baseball figure then expressed the premonitions that prompted him to visit his friend.
“I’m thinking about Tupac,” Baker explained to Nightengale. “Death is just around the corner. I could feel it a little [Monday] a little.”
Mays’ loss comes just before the Giants are scheduled to play the St. Louis Cardinals at Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama, where he got his start playing professional baseball with the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro Leagues.
The game follows MLB officially recognizing the statistics of Negro League players and entering them into the baseball record books.
While the game seemed like a fitting tribute to Mays before his death, the event now takes on even more significance.
The “Say Hey Kid” is widely regarded as one of, if not the, greatest player in baseball history due to his prowess as a hitter and fielder, with his iconic catch in Game 1 of the 1954 World Series being one of the iconic moments in American history. sports history.
The 24-time MLB All-Star spent 22 seasons with the Giants, moving to San Francisco in 1958 when the franchise relocated from New York.
While Mays’ death is sad, Baker can at least take comfort in the fact that he was able to see his old friend one last time.
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