Standing in the outfield at St. Petersburg, Florida’s Payson Field in 1973, the shy Red Sox outfielder was working up the nerve to introduce himself to the icon standing nearby.
Dwight Evans was just 21 at the time, about to begin his first full big league season, while Willie Mays, then 42, was preparing for his final Major League season for the Mets.
As Evans was growing up, first in Hawaii, then in Southern California, Mays, who died this week at age 93, was his favorite player. He was the reason Evans chose No. 24 for his 20-year MLB career.
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“He stood out for me just watching him. I got to see him live as a young kid,” Evans said. “I love what Johnny Bench said after Willie passed: “He was a perfect athlete, a perfect baseball player.’ And he was. They talk about the five attributes of the game. Well, he had six. His instincts were No. 6 along with running and throwing and hitting with power and hitting and fielding. He was a complete player.
“I did wear No. 24 because of him. He was always my favorite player, even though I was growing up in Southern California. Anytime I could watch him on TV I did,” Evans continued. “I always tried to do that basket catch. In batting practice or whatever, playing around. That was something he just did. I don’t know why he did it. I couldn’t do it like him. But I always tried to mess around and catch it that way because he was my favorite.”
Some of Evans’ earliest memories of loving baseball came watching Mays and listening to games on a transistor radio. If the atmospheric conditions and his radio position were just right, Evans could listen to Giants games from his home in Southern California.
As an 11-year-old, despite having his alarm set for 4 a.m. the next day for his paper route, he couldn’t fall asleep on July 2, 1963. He stayed up to listen to the pitchers’ duel between Milwaukee’s Warren Spahn and the Giants’ Juan Marichal. He was rewarded for staying up through all 16 innings by a Mays’ 16th inning walk-off home run in a 1-0 final memorialized as The Greatest Game Ever Pitched.
“I couldn’t go to sleep. I just kept listening to it,” he said.
Maybe he would have mentioned that on the field in Florida that day.
“He was probably 25 feet from me and me being as shy as I am and was, I wanted to go say hello,” Evans said. “I finally got the nerve to go walking towards him. But batting practice ended and he ran off the field. So I didn’t meet him.”
Evans didn’t actually meet Mays until two decades later. Evans was a Rockies’ hitting coach under manager Don Baylor in 1994. They were playing the Giants and through an open door in the visiting coach’s office, Evans saw Mays walk down the hallway.
The 42-year-old Evans was still shy, but wise enough not to let the same opportunity elude him again.
“He walked right by me and I did introduce myself then,” Evans said. “He was a gentleman and so pleasant. It took me a long time to introduce myself to him, but once I did I realized how good of a person he was, not only on the field but off the field.”
During his own career that featured three All-Star appearances and eight gold gloves, Evans earned a similar reputation as a gentleman and was a popular member of two American League pennant-winning Red Sox teams in 1975 and 1986.
His memoir “Dewey: Behind the Golden Glove” with longtime baseball writer Erik Sherman, comes out next month. It’s a book about not only his playing career, but about the challenges of playing while parenting two sons, who both had and eventually died from neurofibromatosis, a condition that causes tumors to form in the brain, spinal cord, and nerves.
Naturally, the book includes a passage about finally meeting Mays. Evans wrote:
“I did manage to make some small talk with him this time. A smile still comes across my face just thinking about the memories of watching him play.”
Evans was remembering Mays this week. For so many in baseball, Major League Baseball’s tribute to the Negro Leagues and their players this week at Rickwood Field Alabama, also became a de facto public memorial for Mays. Evans watched with fond memories.
“He made the game fun for me. I used to emulate him. He made the game look fun. That’s the way it should be,” Evans said. “He was not only a great player, but for me, he was the greatest player ever.”
Follow MassLive sports columnist Matt Vautour on Twitter at @MattVautour424.
