Photo credit: @957thegame
By Jeremy Kahn
SAN FRANCISCO — There may not be a game at AT&T Park on this Thursday morning, but there are people in the stands.
Fans of the San Francisco Giants have flocked to the corner of Third and King Streets to say goodbyes, and pay their respects to number 44, Willie McCovey, who passed away on October 31, at the age of 80.
McCovey, who played 19 of his 22 seasons wearing the Orange and Black was probably the most beloved Giants player of them all, with the exception of fellow Alabama native, the incomparable Willie Mays.
During his Hall of Fame career, McCovey hit 521 home runs, tying him with his boyhood idol Ted Williams and Frank Thomas for 20th place all-time.
In 2588 games, McCovey hit .270, and also drove in 1555 runs in his career. He was also walked 1345 times, including getting intentionally walked 260 times. He also hit 18 grand slams during his career.
When McCovey made his Major League debut on July 30, 1959 for the Giants against the Philadelphia Phillies at Seals Stadium, a game that the Giants would win 7-2 behind a complete game by Mike McCormick before a crowd of 10,114 at Seals Stadium.
In that game, McCovey went 4-for-4 with three runs scored and two runs batted in. He also hit two triples all against future Hall of Famer Robin Roberts.
McCovey played 52 games in that 1959 season, McCovey hit .354 with 13 home runs and 38 runs batted in, as he was named the National League Rookie of the Year. Twenty-seven of McCovey’s 68 hits that season were extra base hits.
McCovey was intentionally walked a then record 45 times in 1969, which would stand as the major-league record until Barry Bonds obliterated that record in 2002, as he was intentionally walked 68 times. Two years later, Bonds was intentionally walked a whopping 120 times, over 2.5 times as many times as McCovey in 1969.
It was in that 1969 season that McCovey won his only National League Most Valuable Player award, as he batted .320 with 45 home runs and drove in 126 runs.
McCovey led the National League in home runs and RBIs, and finished fifth in batting behind Pete Rose, who led the National League with a .348 average.
After the 1973 season, McCovey was traded to the San Diego Padres with Bernie Williams for Mike Caldwell.
In two and a half seasons with the Padres, McCovey played in 321 games, while batting .242 with 52 home runs and 167 runs batted in.
On August 30, 1976, McCovey was purchased by the Oakland Athletics from the Padres. In 11 games with the A’s, McCovey batted .208 with zero home runs and zero runs batted in.
McCovey was granted free agency after the 1976 season, and returned to the Giants, with whom he played his final three and a half years before retiring on July 6, 1980 against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodger Stadium. In his final at-bat, McCovey hit a sacrifice fly off of Rick Sutcliffe to score Jack Clark.
Over his 22-year career, McCovey played in one World Series, where he lined out for the final out to Bobby Richardson in Game Seven of the 1962 World Series that gave the New York Yankees their 20th World Championship. If that hit would have been three feet higher, the Giants would have won the World Series.
Charles Schulz of Peanuts fame issued a cartoon on December 22, 1962 that shows Linus and Charlie sitting down and looking somber, and finally Charlie cries out “Why Couldn’t McCovey have hit the ball just three feet higher.”
McCovey was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1986 with 81.4% of the voting by the Baseball Writers Association of America.
Giants Public Address Announcer Renel Brooks-Moon shared a memory of when her mother met McCovey, and Mrs. Brooks reminded him of what he did in his first game on July 30, 1959.
Team President and Chief Executive Officer Larry Baer, who grew up in the city shared many memories of McCovey, including the first time he met him and sat on his lap at a store on the corner of Geary Blvd. and 29th Ave. Baer told McCovey story years later, and McCovey replied by saying that is why he had all those knee problems.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed shared stories about McCovey the person, as she wanted to leave the baseball stories to the players. Breed spoke about the Junior Giants, and his days in the community of San Francisco.
“This is a family, and we are celebrating a life,” said 1989 Willie Mac Award winner Dave Dravecky.
“I have never been around a more humbler man than Willie McCovey,” Dravecky added, as he stood there on the dais right in front of the pitchers’ mound.
McCovey’s godson Jeff Dudum talked about the man off the field, and shared the stories of how his family found a house for him in the East Bay, and McCovey replied by saying, “Now Jeffrey, I am a Giant and there is no way I can live in A’s territory.”
Baseball Hall of Fame President Jeff Idelson shared stories about the five Hall of Famers from Mobile, Alabama. That included McCovey, Hank Aaron, Ozzie Smith, Billy Williams and Satchel Paige.
McCovey wore the number 44 in honor of Aaron, who made his debut for the Milwaukee Braves in 1954.
Smith mentioned to Idelson that he got his first major league hit off of Jim Barr at Candlestick Park on April 8, 1978, and McCovey gave Smith the ball and said good luck.
Former teammates Gaylord Perry, Felipe Alou, Joe Amalfitano and Orlando Cepeda all shared great stories of their late teammate.
Barry Bonds thanked McCovey for letting him call him Uncle Mac, and mentioned how he was in left, his godfather Willie Mays was in center, his father Bobby in right, Uncle Mac at first, Fuentes at second, Chris Speier at short, he wished Jim Ray Hart could have been at third, Perry on the mound and Dave Rader was the catcher back when Bonds was a kid.
Mike Krukow and the other Willie Mac Award winners in attendance came up, and Krukow spoke about when he faced McCovey at Candlestick Park and McCovey hit his 19th grand slam, but it went foul. McCovey called Krukow number 19 for the rest of his relationship.
Krukow was joined on the dais by Buster Posey, Clark, Shawon Dunston, Nick Hundley, Marvin Benard, Dravecky and Joe Morgan.
The program then continued with a call from a Sunday afternoon game on June 29, 1980, where McCovey hit a game-winning double off of Bobby Castillo of the Dodgers to score Rennie Stennett, as the Giants defeated the Dodgers 4-3 in the first game of a doubleheader between the two longtime rivals.
Finally, like in any Giants home win, the song “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” by Tony Bennett was played, as the San Francisco Fire Department Fire Boats sprayed water from their spouts in McCovey Cove.
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