Happy 55th birthday: Mays vs. Mantle in first episode of 'Home Run Derby'

CBS Sports ^ | January 9, 2015 | By Dayn Perry

[Amagi]

If I had to guess, I’d say a Yankee publicist.

[windcliff]

ping

[Daffynition]

I was told by Neil Sakow [author of “The Most Mickeys on My Mantle”] that it was Mick’s old friend, and mayhem accomplice, Whitey Ford.

http://www.nytimes.com/1993/01/21/nyregion/west-hartford-journal-a-museum-enshrines-a-simpler-era-s-dreams.html

[Amagi]

Thanks.
That's an interesting bit of trivia.

[bobby.223]

Mickey Mantle was the greatest combination of speed and power ever seen in MLB. At one time early on in his career I believe his home to first, from the left side, was timed at 3.1. I don’t know if that has ever been bettered. As far as the stick....nobody ever attacked a pitched ball with more coordinated strength, fury and timing than he did. It is fun to imagine what the individual numbers he would have hung up if his legs stayed as healthy as to 2 of his fellow immortal contemporaries, Willie Mays and Hank Aaron, throughout his full career.

[TBP]

Teach young players to swing like that. And he did it from both sides of the plate.

[TBP]

Maybe Stanton against either Trout or Cabrera?

[TBP]

Drank and caroused too much. Had a hangover one game and deliberately got himself thrown out of a game in his first at bat because he had such a bad hangover.

Mick once said, "If I'd known I was going to live this long, I'd have taken better care of my self."

He also said:

"If the ball looks like this,

O
O
O

take a chance on the middle one."

[TBP]

And The Mick should know. He was a very good bunter himself — best I ever saw.