The day Willie Mays hit a walk off home run and was essentially relegated to the footnotes

[Brother Buzz]

Two future hall of fame high-kicking pitchers, Juan Marichal and Warren Spahn faced off for the dual of the century on July 2, 1963 at the 'Stick'.





On July 2, 1963, Juan Marichal pitched a 16-inning shutout against the Milwaukee Braves, outdueling Warren Spahn, who pitched 151/3 scoreless innings before Willie Mays won it 1-0 with a home run. Marichal threw 227 pitches; Spahn threw 201. (To Hell with that wussy pitch count crap!)

[patphil]

1. They come from a different era of baseball, when pitchers worked a lot more innings.

Spahn is 8th on the all time list of most innings pitched, with 5243, for an average of 252 innings per season.
Marichal's career was a lot shorter, and he only did 3507 innings, for an average of 257 innings per season.
For prospective, there are only 2 active pitchers who have just barely achieved 3000 innings:
Zack Greinke, and Justin Verlander.

I doubt anyone will see 5000 innings in a career again.

Source is:

https://www.baseball-reference.com/

I also looked up complete games; Spahn had 382, #21 on the all-time list. There isn't a single active pitcher among the top 1000, and that goes all the way down to 43 complete games!
I doubt if all the active pitchers in the major leagues today have a combined total of 382 complete games.

[malthaussen]

2. It's not like they were throwing softballs, either...

... IIRC, both pitchers sat out their next rotation, which I'd say they deserved.

But how does Spahnny only K TWO in 15 innings? One of whom, incidentally, was Mays (Marichal the other).

-- Mal

[Brother Buzz]

4. Here's the crazy one: Warren Spahn was the only Braves player to tag an extra-base hit (a double)

Warren Spahn had a respectable stick for a pitcher

[malthaussen]

5. Five days later, Spahn shut out Houston.

So he got one extra day of rest after the SF game. Marichal also got an extra day's rest, but he lost his next start by giving up 2 runs in 7 innings. Marichal won 4 of 5 starts against Milwaukee that year, and Spahn only won 2 of 5 starts against SF; they split the two games where they faced each other.

(I love baseball-reference.com)

-- Mal

[NBachers]

3. Willie Mays circles stadium in a '56 Rocket 88 as San Francisco Giants celebrate his 90th Birthday.

May 7th, 2021

https://www.mlb.com/news/willie-mays-marks-90th-birthday-at-oracle-park

[Brother Buzz]

6. Willie's 53rd birthday

Willie Mays: The Catch" mysteriously popped up on a hillside just south of Petaluma, CA to greet the morning commuters -- May 6, 1984




Kid Ross displayed them in Wyoming when he moved there, but the cutouts ultimately made it to the east coast and were exhibited 460 feet from the plaque denoting where the Polo Grounds home plate was.