Willie McCovey

• Born: January 10, 1938
• Birthplace: Mobile, Alabama
• Died: October 31, 2018
• Place of death: Palo Alto, California

Sport: Baseball

Early Life

Willie Lee McCovey, the seventh of ten children of Frank and Esther McCovey, was born on January 10, 1938, in Mobile, Alabama. His father, Frank, worked for a railway company, and, although the McCoveys were poor, they always managed to scrape by. Frank McCovey was known as a quiet man who seldom spoke, but when he did, the entire family paid attention to what he said.

Growing up in Mobile in the 1940s was difficult; poor African American children had few options. Some joined neighborhood gangs; others hung around street corners or played sports. McCovey and a group of his friends preferred to play baseball, football, and basketball. In baseball, McCovey always played first base. As a youngster, he also tried to help his family by working, first as a newspaper boy and later in a factory.

The Road to Excellence

When McCovey reached the age of sixteen, he quit school, left Mobile, and moved to Los Angeles to join his older brother, Wyat. Alex Pompez, a scout for the New York Giants Major League Baseball (MLB) team, heard from a friend that McCovey had potential. When McCovey had just turned seventeen, the Giants sent him a bus ticket and asked him to report to a tryout camp in Melbourne, Florida. At the tryout, the team management recognized his talent and signed him to a professional contract to play with their farm team in Sandersville, Georgia.

McCovey climbed up the minor-league ladder, playing for four years for different Giants farm teams across the country. In 1958, his last year in the minors, playing for Phoenix at the AAA level, he hit an astounding .372 with 29 home runs.

The Emerging Champion

Despite that terrific season, the Giants did not call Willie up to the majors right away. The team, which had just moved to San Francisco, had an enviable dilemma. They had another young star, Orlando Cepeda, who had won the Rookie of the Year Award in 1958 and played first base—the same position as McCovey.

Finally, on July 30, 1959, McCovey got the call to the big leagues. He reported to Seals Stadium in San Francisco. In his first game, against the Philadelphia Phillies’ star pitcher (and a future Hall-of-Famer) Robin Roberts, he had four consecutive hits in four at bats. In the remaining fifty-two games of the season, he batted .354 and hit 13 home runs, earning the Rookie of the Year Award in the National League (NL).

After that great start, things did not go smoothly for McCovey during the next few seasons. At the plate, opposing pitchers found that they could get him out by throwing him pitches high and inside. In the field, he was called on to play the outfield and first base, shuttling back and forth. Another problem was that he did not play in the starting lineup every day.

McCovey came of age in the 1962 World Series against the New York Yankees. He hit a home run to win a game, but, ironically, it was an out that gained him greater recognition. In the seventh and deciding game, with two men on base, McCovey hit a blistering line drive toward right field that would have won the series for the Giants if the Yankees’ second baseman Bobby Richardson had not snared it for the final out.

Finally, McCovey became a fixture in the Giants’ lineup. With the exception of an off-year in 1964, when he was saddled with injuries and saddened by the death of his father, his slugging made him a feared hitter in the National League. After 1965, “Stretch”—as he was affectionately nicknamed because of his lanky, 6-foot 4-inch, 198-pound frame—stopped shuffling between the outfield and the infield and found a regular niche at first base. Batting cleanup behind the legendary Willie Mays and just ahead of the Giants’ hard-hitting third baseman, Jim Ray Hart, he was an integral part of the Giants’ potent offense. However, the Giants never had the pitching staff to go along with its offense, so the 1962 series was McCovey’s only World Series opportunity throughout his twenty-two-year career.

Continuing the Story

In many ways, McCovey was overshadowed during the early part of his big-league career by Mays, the Giants’ center fielder. Mays could do it all—run, throw, and hit—and with his lively personality, he had captured the imagination of the entire nation, and especially the Giants’ fans. Not surprisingly, there was always a bit of rivalry between the two superstars, and they never really got along well. Not until the late 1960s did the younger and quieter McCovey emerge from Mays’s shadow and put together two phenomenal seasons. In 1968 and 1969, he led the National League in home runs, RBIs, and slugging percentage, becoming the first player in NL history to finish first in all three categories in consecutive years. In the 1969 All-Star Game he hit two home runs to help the National League beat the American League.

In recognition of his accomplishments, McCovey was an obvious choice for the NL Most Valuable Player in 1969. Amazingly, he put together an awesome campaign despite painful calcium deposits that caused bleeding in his right hip when he swung hard or when he extended himself in the field. His walk total was an indication of the respect that pitchers accorded him; in 1969, he received 121 walks, and in 1970, a league-leading 137, including a then-NL record of 45 intentional walks. He hit three homers in a game twice in his career and hit two home runs in the same inning twice.

Despite his success, injuries continued to plague McCovey, and in 1974 he was traded to the San Diego Padres. The Giants, who had traded Mays to the New York Mets a year before, was trying to rebuild its fortunes, but trading the two Willies was unpopular with the Giants’ fans. After a few seasons in San Diego (and a brief stint with the Oakland Athletics), the Giants’ management, in an effort to bolster its sagging attendance, brought the popular McCovey home in 1977 to finish his playing career in San Francisco. In 1980 he retired after twenty-two seasons in the big leagues.

After he retired, the Giants gave McCovey a seven-year contract and a front-office position working in community relations in the Bay Area. His public appearances often helped with ticket sales and promotions. The team retired his jersey number, forty-four, in 1980, and he remained a beloved hero to many sports fans in the city. In April 2000 the Giants played their first game in their new $319 million ballpark on San Francisco Bay. A small channel of water beyond the right-field wall was named McCovey Cove to honor the Giants Hall of Famer, and a statue of Willie was erected in the adjacent China Basin Park.

Along with his continued involvement with the Giants, McCovey pursued a variety of business ventures after retiring as a player. However, late in life he faced a series of health challenges and regularly used a wheelchair. He died on October 31, 2018, at the age of eighty after being hospitalized with an infection.

Legacy

Willie McCovey in his prime was an imposing sight. His muscular build and powerful swing struck fear in opposing pitchers, and he is remembered as one of baseball's greatest power hitters. His accomplishments, including 521 home runs and more than 2,200 hits, assured him a spot in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. He became only the sixteenth player in history to be voted into baseball immortality in his first year of eligibility.

Bibliography

Freedman, Lew. African American Pioneers of Baseball: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2007.

Goldstein, Richard. "Willie McCovey, 80, Dies; Hall of Fame Slugger With the Giants." The New York Times, 31 Oct. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/10/31/obituaries/willie-mccovey-dead.html. Accessed 6 July 2020.

Johanson, Matt, and Wylie Wong. Giants: Where Have You Gone? Champaign, Ill.: Sports, 2007.

McCovey, Willie. The Hall of Fame Giants: In Commemoration of Willie McCovey’s Induction, Summer 1986. San Francisco: Woodford, 1986.

Thomson, Bobby, and Phil Pepe. Few and Chosen: Defining Giants Greatness Across the Eras. Chicago: Triumph Books, 2007.

"Willie McCovey." National Baseball Hall of Fame, 2020, baseballhall.org/hall-of-famers/mccovey-willie. Accessed 6 July 2020.