Mickey Mantle: The Hardest Ball I Ever Hit
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- Опубликовано: 18 ноя 2008
- Mickey Mantle tells the story behind the "hardest ball I ever hit." Excerpted from the award-winning program, "Mickey Mantle: The American Dream Comes To Life®" - Available on DVD at 1-800-THE MICK / www.themick.com.
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I saw that homerun. The ball got up to the facade in about 1 second, I kid you not. It was a line drive, frozen rope all the way up.
The guy was my hero. Pure magic. Pure charisma. He had the heart of every boy in America. As for me, because of The Mick, I tried to switch hit, I tried to limp like him, I walked up to the plate with my head down. Old pics of him still give me chills. Ran like a thundering herd and could hit a baseball into orbit. The greatest ballplayer of all time when he was right. Tragedy that he didn't take care of himself. I miss you Mick.
Mickey Mantle was a true legend. The all time King of baseball. R.I.P. Mr Mantle.
If Mickey Mantle would have never, ever been injured, he would have easily been the greatest player that ever lived. He would have hit around 800 home runs, probably close to 4,000 hits, and if he would have been an average hitter rather than a power hitter, he would have broken Cobb's stolen base record. And with that speed, he would have possibly been the greatest defensive outfielder of all time. His ability was absolutely unparalleled.
I had forgotten about that one, it is legendary. He had another big one at the old Griffith Stadium in DC back in the 50's which traveled 600 feet or so. But I used to love watching him play when they had the "Game of the Week" with Dizzy Dean and Pee Wee Reese. 'Ole Diz loved Mickey and would have a great time telling stories and advertising Falstaff beer and if Mick had a big day, that would be even better.
I started following Mickey Mantle in 1959, when I was 8 years old. My grandfather in NYC used to take me to games, we lived 50 miles away. Even a little kid could see the greatness, the speed, power and charisma, though he was hurt a lot. The shot he talks about happened in 1963 when he was healthy for a while and really connecting. We watched the night game on TV, actually anticipating something special. It was an impossible shot, like a missile, it kept rising; truly stunning moment.
I was 8 years old and like everyone else loved the Mick. We were sitting behind 1st base and I was keeping score. When the ball was hit the stadium fell silent as everyone watched the ball. I never saw a ball hit so hard. I remember a fan behind me say "its out". The ball disappeared between the lights and the darkness, and bounced all the way back near second base. A monumental shot. Ever since when I went to the stadium I would look up to where the ball hit the façade and was awed.
Yogi Berra was coaching first base and he said the ball was still climbing when it hit the facade
@deepcosmiclove I was there with my dad. I was 12 years old and when he hit it the sound to me sounded like cannon fire. It was simply the most amazing thing I have even seen.
Had Mickey stayed healthy he would have been the greatest player in baseball history. He was so fast it was ridiculous, and he hit the ball further than anyone, maybe in baseball history except for Josh Gibson. He could hit for average, a great fielder. I wish I could have seen him play
A once in a lifetime talent - what a beast. Keep in mind that this was not only before steroids, but if you were a baseball player in Mickeys day, weight training was strictly verboten. "It'll make you musclebound", you were told.
Imagine Mickey clean & sober with todays medical treatment and baseball specific weight training.
(Continued from previous): One final note: Mickey himself attributed his power and strength to the work and chores I mentioned, and his weight gain to the abundant food the team provided during training and on the road. He cited his work as a "screen ape" in particular. Smashing rocks with a sledgehammer for hours every day for a summer - a motion similar to swinging a bat - helped build Mickey's incredibly strong arm, shoulder, back and leg muscles - perfect for a power hitter.
Red Sox announcer once said that Kirk Gibson came down the first base line like Mickey Mantle. Bob Montgomery said "Nobody came down the first base line like Mickey Mantle!"
i got to see him play in cleve alot -they booed him when he came to bat - but when he hit a home run the place would go crazy - i smile everytime i see old clips then a tear - i'm 60 it's like yesterday
i believe the longest homer ever RECORDED was by Mickey Mantle, and it was 565 feet. that is MONSTER shot. Nobody even in the steroid era has come close to hitting it that far. Josh Hamilton's shots at the 2008 Derby were 510 MAX!!!
Rest in peace mick,You where the greatist long ball hitter ever..If you dont think so look up the 10 longest home runs hit by Mickey mantle
Mickey was first and foremost a power hitter. When Yankees' scout Tom Greenwade discovered Mickey he was scouting another player. Mickey hit two home runs in the game Greenwade attended that went into a river some distance beyond the park. Those home runs are what caught Greenwade's attention. While Mickey did play shortstop, it was a position assigned to him almost in desperation. In his reports to the team Harry Craft, Mickey's manager in C ball, told the team to move him away from shortstop.
i cant see why MLB refuses to give mick his due,they have 70 best catches and dont mention the catch he made that saved don larsons perfect game what kind of shit is that.all they do is pound us over the head with mays catch the mantle catch was alot better yet not a word of mickey?? mick fans need to unite and make them respect him...
@dxarmy94 I saw him plenty (starting in 1959) so let me answer. He was very, very strong, and not very tall, maybe 5 ft 10, for leverage. He swung as hard as he could on practically every pitch, and he loved fast balls. If he knew he was getting a fastball, and his legs were not bothering him, tape measure shot. I saw the karoom off the third deck shot in '64 on live TV, the one that bounced back to the infield. and the amazing thing was it was not unexpected. He was healthy that month.
I almost saw Mickey Mantle hit a grand slam homerun in Washington against The Senators.Bases loaded and Mantle hit one that looked like it was gone in right center.It was September 19,1962.The rightfielder caught it right up against the fence.I looke at the flagpole nearby in center and it ws just whipping in.The damn wind kept it from going all the way out and I was so frustrated.I did see Bobby Richardson get his 200th hit of the season.Yankees scored 4 runs in the 9th to win 8-6
I'm a HUGE fan of the Mick. The homer almost getting out of Yankee Stadium. The 565-foot blast. And it appears that he played his entire career with a torn ACL. Would've hit 800 home runs without injuries and alcohol problems.
The Mick was the most talented player ever. Had he stayed healthy he would have been the greatest player in
baseball history and there would be no debate. He may be the fastest player afoot ever and he smashed the ball
farther than anyone. He could also hit for average, had a great arm, and was a great fielder. He is probably the greatest clutch hitter in late innings ever and in big games (check out his World Series records). He was a leader and a winner and he did it without PED's. The most unbelievable thing about Mickey is he more than likely did all with a torn ACL. Mickey is the MANtle.
No harm - no foul. I recall the Ramos homer, which was his first or second façade shot - a spectacular blast also, but closer to the foul line and not quite as high. I think Mickey's shot into the center-field "black" seats was the first of three homers he hit there, making it the first homer anyone hit into the "black" seats. At 461 feet to the wall in center-field at Yankee Stadium it was a mighty clout. Mickey's 565-foot Griffith Stadium homer coined the term, "tape-measure home run."
saw the homer he's talking about on tv-it was just crushed.....was late in the game-a night game-the ball bounced back into short fight field behind where the 2nd baseman stands...mel allen was announcing on wpix (unusual because he didn't usually have the late shift)...he was at a loss for words (even MORE unusual).....was there when he hit a screaming liner to right that hit the 296 ft sign and ricocheted and HANDCUFFED the right fielder-let me say that again-the ball handcuffed the right fielder-i couldn't believe how hard that was hit....mantle got a single-a 296ft hardest hit single ever....
@curtisjones400 That reminds of what happened when a sportswriter in the mid-1960s asked one of Ty Cobb's former teammates what he thought Cobb would hit if he were playing in the Major Leagues then (after the leagues expanded in the early 1960s). He thought a moment and said, "Oh, probably .300." The surprised sportswriter asked, "Why only .300?" Cobb's teammate replied, "Well, you have to remember that Cobb's been dead for several years."
@itchmay1 Mickey was my favorite player growing up in the 50's too. In the 60's I became a big Willie McCovey fan but Mickey was still number ONE. I was wondering the other day. I read back when Mickey played, they played with the same ball until it was hit where a fan could get it or it was too much trouble. They used about 50 to 60 balls a game. Now they use about a 120. Just a slight scuff or hard bounce of the wall and out it goes. Pitcher could have advantage. Mickey didn't get that luxury.
i'm a mantle guy...he had more power than dimag-whenever i sat in the upper deck at the stadium i'd look up at the facade-you couldn't believe that anybody could hit the ball that far.....
It was during a night game - not part of a double header. There was a physics professor from a university who calculated, the next day, that the ball would have gone 625 feet on the fly had it not hit the facade. I remember it well. Mantle was an amazing ballplayer - the fastest to have ever played the game; officially hit the longest HR (535 feet in the old Washington DC park; suffered from osteomilitis, a bone disease; about half the size of Barry Bonds; and, yes, he was hung over many days.
the reason for the disagreement about which game came this "hardest ball I ever hit" was that he bounced one off the facade two times. Once in '56 and again in '63. The first was more of a lofting hit, allegedly, the second, as is testified by every single person who witnessed it, was a straight line drive. It was calculated that had it not hit anything (impossible in the Bronx, even if it made it out of the park, which no fair ball ever did) it would have gone well over 700 feet.
@lewearly (Continued from my previous comment): Mickey made a game of who could smash rocks the longest. Already strong from doing farm chores and jobs like digging graves, Mickey could go much longer than the other screen ape. Often he smashed rock for five or more hours a day!
There's probably no better exercise for hitting home runs than smashing rocks with a sledge hammer. Thus his nickname, "Muscles," and why the press called him "Mr. Muscles." He was one of the strongest players ever.
You're right about the 3.1 speed! Because he was such a humble guy in public. I did hear him in an interview state that the 3.1 speed that he was timed at had the advantage of him doing a drag bunt when clocked. In other words he sort of had a running start already. So I do believe the time may be accurate! Wayne Arthur
(Continued from previous): To characterize Mickey as a speedy shortstop who built his strength after he came to the majors is incorrect. His rookie spring training in 1951, when he weighed about 165, was one of the greatest ever. 19-year-old Mickey led the team in homers and rbi. The majority of his homers were tape measure shots hit where few or none had been hit before. I did not intend to glorify or romanticize manual labor. But Mickey did build his strength from his work, not weights.
I love the people who question his raw power. Next time you're at yankee stadium look how friggin high up and far out the white facade is. He hit a rocket that hit that shit still going up. How many people in the steroid era hit the white facade? Like nobody. Mantle hit legit moon shots. My father watched baseball 60 plus years. He said he never heard anyone hit a ball a hard as Mantle. The crack of the bat if you were at the stadium watching was enough to know. He longest and hardest hit ball I ever witnessed was Juan Encarnacion in yankee stadium. He put one in the upper black section in dead center. The whole stadium got quiet for a minute because the crack of the bat was deafening. That was July 24 2001 off Ramiro Mendoza.
i remember reading about this when i was younger, reporters were saying the ball was still rising when it bounced off the top of the stadium. if only there was footage
I saw him play many times when they played at chicago. we lived in central indy but would drive up. we would sit in center field bleachers and wait battling practice balls. I remember mickey beating out a lot of ground balls to first he could run really fast especially when he hit lefthanded. I always admired his ability and took his number playing football at high school.
(Continued from my previous reply): Mantle himself said he was never suited for shortstop. Furthermore, Mickey wasn't a typical day laborer. His chores at home and his work for the mines (he never actually worked in the mines) was ideal for building the strength necessary to become a power hitter. His weight gain was more a product of a good diet with ample food than from no longer performing manual labor. As a rookie Mickey was touted as the next Ruth, Gehrig and DiMaggio because of his power.
If you are saying that Mickey's story "The Hardest Ball I Ever Hit" is not true then your memory is faulty. Mickey hit that ball off Bill Fischer of the A's on May 22, 1963. It was a walk-off homer, winning the game in the 11th inning, 8-7. It was a night game, not a doubleheader. The Yankees scored seven runs in the second, but in the eighth the A's came back to tie it, 7-7. That was still the score when Mickey led off the 11th. The count was 2 and 2 when The Mick crushed his historic homer.
Just brut strength. All those years as a youngster just swining sledg hammers and doing manual labor. Everyone now-a-days lives in a temperature control gym training to play. Just imagine if he had cared about every single homerun? The stadiums especially now would have been dwarfed.
there is a website called "themick" that has extremely detailed information (with pictures) of mickey's 10 longest home runs.
Mick must've forgotten his shot at Detroit. It went over the Right Field roof, and landed in the lumber yard across Trumbull Street.
he also hit one out of Griffith Stadium in D.C. that was supposedly in the 540-575 ft range...
I think a fellow Oklahoman,astronaut Gordon Cooper was in orbit around the Earth that night and the Mick made a comment about that.Astronaut Cooper was the first American to spend more than one day in space.It was in May of 1963.
one word awsome
really?? The dimensions were short down the lines, but that's it. Let me ask you this. How many balls did Mantle hit to deep center field in Yankee Stadium that were caught for outs? Center field was 461 feet away from home plate when Mantle played, left-center was 457, and right-center was 408, so you can bet that he hit MANY balls that traveled over 420 feet and were outs. Besides, Mantle hit more career home runs on the road, so Yankee Stadium clearly didn't give him much of an advantage.
@Mastophales
Yes it did! Remember watching that titanic shot as a Teen; that was jaw-dropping and even though I could not stand Reggie, it was a Baseball moment that I will never forget !
If memory serves me a taped replay of that home run shows that when the ball hit the facade it bounced UPWARDS, not down ( hence Mickey's saying it bounced way back in towards the infield ). This would imply that the ball was still going UP, not down. Think about it!
i may have seen mickeys highest home run at old comiskey Mick hit what looked like a high pop no one swung like mickey he uncoiled and started limping to first the right fielder drifted back and started to turn in circles Mick was reaching second when the right fielder turned back towards infield and reached up and caught the ball huh? we were under overhang and couldnt see the ball cliped the roof facade and came straight down to right fielder mick was near 3rd lol crowd murmured for an hour
Yeah, when you're discussing Mickey Mantle or Reggie Jackson, in the end, the cream rises to the top. These men are honored at the highest level, as they deserve to be. They are among the game's very greatest.
everybody go to youtube under mickey mantle old timers day,and see him hit a shot at old yankee stadium in 1973!!!!
you're both misremembering a press conference at which ty cobb was asked in 1960 what he would hit if he faced "today's pitchers." he said he might be able to hit .300. the reporter asked him, "is that all?" and cobb answered, "well remember, i'm 73 years old."
He hit the ball so hard and so far, it was downright frightening.
I think if he had steroids, he'd have killed himself by swinging right out of his skin.
If Mantle had done that today, he could forget about his legacy because everyone would assume that he was on steroids. Same with Maris. Nowadays, people would suspect someone who had one 61 home run season to go along with a handful of seasons when he hit 23-39 home runs.
hugh duffy, .440 in 1894, ty cobb, 3 times, rogers hornsby, 3 times, ed delahanty, 3 times, and theres more where that cam from
Oh how I wish I grew up in this era. I was 10 years old growing up watching the McGwire vs Sosa race to 62 still fun to watch despite the steroids however..what year was this interview with Mantle?
I agree with you there,seems todays players are on the juice just to hit like the greats use to.
Look at his facial features and listen to him talk. This is Troy Aikman in 20 years or so.
Is that Homerun that unofficially went 643 feet?
Josh Gibson is a player MLB plays up to be the long ball hitter of all time but I have never been able to find anything on his HRs?????
@Sprichtube I can't belive there are some people that refuse to look at it as being a long HR, some person wrote a book and said that the shot was a figment of there imagination for the people who saw the shot???????
That homerun was hit by Babe Ruth (643 in Detroit). Mickey's longest homerun was hit in Washington, against the Senators. If memory serves, it was measured at 546 feet. In that park, one had to hit it a mile, since the distance down the leftfield line was around 400 feet (somewhat shorter in right, but about the same in center).
They onced asked a famous baseball player that use to play in the late 1950's -if he were playing baseball today how many home runs does he think he would hit-he answered about 15-why only 15 homeruns? the baseball player asnwered i'm 70 Ha Ha
DiMaggio, hitting righty all the time, probably hit more to the distant 457' area than mick. my first game, 23 jul '47, joe hit a one bounce triple off that sign.
The fact that Cobb may have said that in a press conference in 1960 does not mean that I am misremembering the incident I described. Perhaps Cobb's teammate was paraphrasing Cobb from the press conference you describe, but I'm not misremembering what he told the reporter.
Thanks. My memory wasn't faulty, but neither was Mickey's. The game I was talking about was on May 30th, 1956 during the first game of a double header, off Pedro Ramos. That's the one I saw. I don't know how I missed the "hardest" one. I tried to include a link to a story about that one - MM ten top homers, but I think links don't work here.
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@PRican522 Barry would still be a good player, maybe a great player, but not a 500+ homer player. He could have hit 350 homers, 3,000 hits and a lifetime .300-.310 without the drugs. Still HOF material.
why would 3 people dislike this?
28 major leaguers have hit .400 or better several of them more than once. Ted Williams was the last to do it, back in 1941 with a .406 average.
@mannyrama They say he was so strong because he was a coal miners son and while he was in high school he worked in the mines and this is where he developed his power.
The 737 ft hr wasn't Ruth's. It's an estimate of how far this homer would've gone. There's no actual measurement because It hit the façade. Otherwise it probably would've been his longest. Note that he calls it "the hardest," not the longest.
Mickey's 565-foot Griffith Stadium (DC) hr got more publicity and coined the term "tape-measure" home run. The Guinness Book of World Records lists it as the longest hr "measured when it was hit." Mickey hit at least two hrs farther than it.
Good for you Curtis! Thank you for playing baseball well for as long as you did!
mickey also hit a 634 foot homer in 1953.
@bigbadbruins1 Darned shame he didn't get a chance in the majors; my father, born in 1920 in the Bronx said the Babe was the greatest he ever saw, though Lou Gehrig had as much raw power. but that he'd heard that Gibson had more raw power than either one of them (but never actually saw him play).
@Christlovesanimals No kidding. Amen to that.
It was against the Kansas City As, not the Royals.
@doesyourgodcomeinaca exactly what ruth used!
@lewearly My God that's even better than what I said. What a beast.
Mantle had a perfect swing from the right side of the plate.....he wasn't a big man by today's standards.....#7 had skills. Not too shabby from the left side either, but wasn't perfect because of the bad knee.
the ball was the way up wen hit the facade which is unreal if u think about it...im glad to share mantles bday
So what was it ruled?
I didn't say Ruth hit a 737ft homer (coronachilla did). The 643ft HR Ruth did hit was an estimate, based on where the ball was found (in the lumber yard next to then Briggs Stadium).
Thanks for correcting my distance on Mickey's "longest" HR. I have no doubt that Mickey hit some farther, since he had such incredible power.
I called he answered
['a hicks'] comments of 'unbelievable stories' that grow with time. Those stories about Mantle weren't created recently. Their origins go back a half century to when he was playing. A RUclips fantasy camp vid shows Mantle explaining the technique of drag bunting, and how he managed a 3.1 sec. time to 1st base.
( 5q2Qx6gVXq0 ) Tangible, not fictional.
Yes, story telling can alter reality. Almost as much as the cliches used by critics of the store tellers.
@hnksnw that was probably the one he hit off fred green in the '60 WS.
The only steorids Ruth took was in the hot dogs he ate.
Was he batting right or left?
Mickey was batting left-handed against the Athletics' right-handed pitcher Bill Fischer.
that hit ball was legitimately a 600 ft plus ball. I saw the first facade hit in May of 1956. This was harder and further, a lot further.
Mickey hit more long HRs than Ruth OR J,Gibson plenty of proof out there.....
['a hicks'] comments of 'unbelievable stories' that grow with time. Those stories about Mantle weren't created recently. Their origins go back a half century to when he was playing. Mick explains his 3.1 sec time to 1st base (youtube search "Mickey Mantle tells secret of Drag Bunt"). Tangible, not fictional.
Story telling can alter reality...as can careless cliches used by critics of the store tellers. What's undeniable: speed + power + "je ne sais quoi" = pure Mantle
@doesyourgodcomeinaca .......not illegal in most states..........maybe Utah.....
I hate the Yanks but you are a true baseball fan for remebering the Griffith stadium shot that actually went into the street! Too bad that the old timers are not respected like they should be. What happened to a wonderful man like Buck O'neil to be inducted into the HOF after he died was shameful. We need to get rid of that used car salesman Bud Selig asap...at least Fehr is out...what a couple of scumbags.....!
Andy Hawkins threw a no hitter in Old Comiskey and lost 4-0 and never got credit that he deserved because baseball is as fucked up as wrestling...I believe that he had some issues with walking batters and the fielders made at least 2-3 errors in the latter part of the game.....
how do you know when Bonds started doing steroids??
he is a real ball player. all these new guys taking drugs to get good. these guys back then were just good. give him a schlitz and homers result. give bonds ghb lol GO MICKEY
If today's players are all supposed to be on HGH and steroids, then how come they can't hit the ball 540 feet? How does a player with two bum knees hit a ball 540 feet? How does a 30-HR a year hitter like Roger Maris suddenly hit 61 home runs? Hitting home runs has nothing to do with skill. It's all about strength. That's why players like Dunn and Canseco can have shitty batting averages and still pop 40 home runs, and why players like Ichiro can hit .350 and hit only 10.
@MLBcelebrity mickey is an immortal dr. phil is not!
@Christlovesanimals YES YES YES U R RIGHT...
The ball was still rising when it hit the facade because it bounced *** ALL *** the way back to the infield!!! Many seem to ignore this fact.
The ball *** FEARED *** Mantle.
It's funny how people adore the stories of hard, sweaty manual labor conditioning athletes for prodigious feats of strength. I invite those coining these stories to actually look at a typical day laborer. Truth of the matter is teammates and historical records point out that Mick debuted as a speedy shortstop in the minors in 1949, weighing about 160 pounds. Mantle put on slabs of muscle around 1950 because he DIDN'T have to do dangerous, repetitive manual labor anymore.
@tomloft2000 I've heard 734 but I doubt that he hit a ball 20% farther than anyone has ever hit a ball. 600 I could see as a possibility but I will say in all the years I've watched baseball I have never once seen anyone come close to hitting the facade. Closest would have to be Josh Hamilton and he was nowhere near the facade.
Oh, one more thing... not taking anything away from all the great Yankees over the years, but it was easier to hit HR's in Yankee Stadium than most others, so that helped the Yanks in half their games, not to mention their insane budgets.