Willie Mays died on Tuesday, just days before being honored at MLB’s Rickwood Field Game in Birmingham.
On Thursday, MLB will pay tribute to the Negro Leagues with the Giants and Cardinals playing a regular-season game at Rickwood — the historic home of the Birmingham Black Barons — in Alabama, the first time MLB will play in the state.
Mays’ connection to Rickwood, after having grown up nearby with dreams of playing at the field years before his legendary Hall of Fame baseball career, was one of the reasons the league chose the location for Thursday’s historic game.
At 17 years old, Mays began his professional career in the Negro Leagues with the Barons, before signing with the New York Giants in 1950, launching a 22-season MLB career.
A day before his passing, Mays, who was 93, announced that he would not be attending the game in Birmingham.
“I wish I could come out to Rickwood Field this week to be with you all and enjoy that field with my friends. Rickwood’s been part of my life for all of my life. Since I was a kid. It was just ‘around the corner there’ from Fairfield [the town where Mays went to high school], and it felt like it had been there forever. Like a church.
“The first big thing I ever put my mind to was to play at Rickwood Field. It wasn’t a dream. It was something I was going to do. I was going to work hard to be one of the Birmingham Black Barons and play ball at Rickwood Field. That’s what I did. It was my start. My first job. You never forget that. Rickwood Field is where I played my first home game, and playing there was IT — everything I wanted.
“I’d like to be there, but I don’t move as well as I used to. So I’m going to watch from my home. But it will be good to see that. I’m glad that the Giants, Cardinals and MLB are doing this, letting everyone get to see pro ball at Rickwood Field. Good to remind people of all the great ball that has been played there, and all the players. All these years and it is still here. So am I. How about that?”
