Willie Mays

SF Giants legend Willie Mays should be MLB’s logo, says ESPN writer

By Gabe Lehman

In the hours since it was announced that San Francisco Giants great Willie Mays has died, tributes have poured in from all over the sports and cultural landscape. On Wednesday morning, ESPN baseball writer Buster Onley joined that chorus with a slightly different tune, calling for Mays to be enshrined as the logo for Major League Baseball. 

During an appearance on ESPN’s “Get Up” on Wednesday morning, Olney compared the idea to the late Jerry West, whose silhouette serves as the basis for the National Basketball Association’s logo. 

“He absolutely should be the logo of Major League Baseball. Because of that incredible style, because he was so good at everything,” Olney said. “In Tim (Kurkjian)’s piece, he mentioned, he hit for average, he hit for power, he could play defense, he could throw, he could steal bases.”

Olney continued: “Look, if the logo in Major League Baseball was that image of Willie Mays in the 1954 World Series with his back to home plate making that over-the-shoulder catch, all you would need would be the silhouette and you’d know exactly who that was. Just as we know exactly who the logo is in the NBA.”

During Game 1 of the 1954 World Series, with the game tied 2-2 in the eighth inning and runners on first and second and nobody out, Cleveland batter Vic Wertz launched a flyball to the Polo Grounds' incredibly deep center field that looked destined to give Cleveland the lead. But Mays sprinted back, face turned fully away from home plate, and made a heroic snowball catch at the base of the wall. Then, in one motion, he pivoted around and fired the ball in from in front of the fence and prevented Larry Doby, the runner who was tagging up from second, from scoring.

The Giants went on to escape that jam without giving up a run, win Game 1 and sweep the World Series (their last for the next 56 years). “The Catch” went on to become one of the defining moments in Major League Baseball history.

Olney believes the play should be immortalized further, as the MLB logo for generations to come. 

According to MLB.com, the MLB logo of a white silhouetted batter against a red and blue backdrop, was designed in 1968 and incorporated on jerseys a year later. The silhouette is believed to be based on Minnesota Twins slugger Harmon Killebrew, a Hall of Famer with 573 home runs. The man who designed the logo, Jerry Dior, has disputed this, however.

Given the (supposed) lack of direct inspiration, if MLB did decide to change it, modeling the logo after Mays, who is considered by many to be one of the greatest - if not the greatest - players of all time, would be hard to argue.