Willie Davis has died at age 69. A friend found him dead at his home in Burbank. It's hard to believe he was 69. I remember that Vin Scully called him the "3 Dog" because it referred to something like a racing greyhound. And I remember that he was a Roosevelt alumnus from hearing about that from students from Roosevelt who also worked after school at the post office at Terminal Annex with me and a lot of other high school student workers back in my senior year.
Davis was just fast and he was on the Dodgers beginning in the 60's, replacing Duke Snider in centerfield. It was a time when there was good pitching with Drysdale, Koufax, and Podres among the names that quickly come to me as starters back when you had a lot of 20-game winners with lots of completed games. The bullpen was really good then, too.
The base running show in baseball seemed to belong to the Dodgers with shortstop Maury Wills being the pioneer in modern base stealing. Davis was able to steal bases and could advance on batted balls very effectively, getting more bases out of a play than some players in the same situation.
When Maury Wills got on base as the regular lead off hitter, there was always a chant of "Go,Go, Go" when he was on a base stealing binge. Wills got on base and no matter how many moves a pitcher had and how many times he had Wills diving back to the bag to avoid a pick off, Wills could still get that stolen base. And then this repeated to move over to third many times, too. I'm sure all that experience of playing with Wills helped Willie Davis get his own base-stealing skills improved quickly. Later base runners broke Wills' record that was 50 stolen bases, as I recall. Lou Brock was probably the next record holder, and then later a lot more. Wills made it an art.
But Willie Davis just had pure speed and it seemed could get to any ball in the field in a few strides and on the bases, he could get around just about as fast. He could hit, too. Another thing about him was his deep, deep voice that was instantly recognizable when he was on pre-game or post-game shows. The Dodgers back then were like the movie stars of old, a lot of glamour and ability to perform. These days I just can't get used to the idea of being a fan of millionaires with a roster that constantly changes. It's progress that reflects other changes in life where you can't expect to have the same job all your life and a few career changes during that time is the prediction.
"Dodgers' Davis, who hit in 31 straight, dies - Center fielder batted .279 with 2,561 hits in his 16-year career." By Bailey Stephens, MLB.com
http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20100309&content_id=8729952&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb
I sure hate to hear about the passing of the people that gave us some real shows as athletes and others in the music field with the same ability to give us some good entertainment and memories. Well, Sandy Koufax is still around and so is Maury Wills. And don't forget Vin Scully, the announcer that's been modelled after by so many and has created a lot of descriptive phrases that have become regularly used by others. The "Towering Fly Balls" and a fielder "on his horse" to get to a ball, were examples of such color that's gifted the L.A. Dodgers audiences over the years. Many of the Dodgers of the 60s have passed on, but a few still are around and have a lot of stories they could tell us.
[For the Willie Davis wikipedia listing with some impressive stats, summaries and details, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willie_Davis_(baseball) ]
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