Mantle Reality

[drmondobueno]

1. His legs were bad. After hurting his leg in 1951, he played in pain the rest of his career.

2. Both his father and grandfather died young, in their forties, and Mick was terrified the same was happening to him. He admitted later in life he did not take care of himself, and drank a little.

I am sure baseball historians could put things much more accurately than I have. I remember conversations between my dad and uncle talking about how Mick looked like he was always hurting when he ran. This was around 1959-1960. At the time I was a Yogi fan ( how many world series championships ?) at the age of seven and later would wear a Maris jersey before I saw Clemente play. Never saw Mantle in person but saw him play dozens of times on the tube. Mays was healthy, Mantle wasn’t.