On Monday, Willie Mays issued a statement expressing his regret in being unable to attend “MLB at Rickwood Field: A Tribute to the Negro Leagues” in Birmingham on Thursday night. But he added he looked forward to watching it with the rest of nation at home.

But “The Say Hey Kid” never got the chance.

The San Francisco Giants announced on Tuesday night that Mays had died at the age of 93. The Giants said the Baseball Hall of Famer “passed away peacefully this afternoon.”

One of the reasons that Major League Baseball chose Rickwood Field for its celebration of the Negro Leagues was its association with Mays, who played his first game as pro there with the Birmingham Black Barons in 1948.

Mays was born not far from Rickwood in Westfield, a mill town that no longer exists. Mays, on the other hand, built a baseball legacy that will live forever.

When pundits and fans debate the greatest player in baseball history, Mays is among the handful of stars who must be included in the argument.

An illustration of Mays’ all-around ability: He’s the only player in modern baseball history (since 1901) to lead the National League in home runs and stolen bases, which he did four times each, and he still holds the Major League record for putouts by an outfielder more than 50 years past his final game.

Mays played 15 seasons for San Francisco, and he provided a link between Rickwood’s history and Thursday event’s purpose, which will match the Giants against the St. Louis Cardinals in a National League game.

Mays was born in Westfield in 1931. Now an unincorporated area between Pleasant Grove and Fairfield west of Interstate 20 in Jefferson County, Westfield was built as a mining town for Tennessee Coal and Iron Company but was a U.S. Steel town when Mays arrived.

Mays starred in football and basketball at Fairfield Industrial High School and in baseball in the Fairfield Industrial League, playing with his father, William Howard “Cat” Mays Sr.

“My father didn’t have money for me to go to college,” Mays wrote in his autobiography “Say Hey.” “And at that particular time, they didn’t have black quarterbacks, and I don’t think I could have made it in basketball because I was only 5-11, so I just picked baseball.”

The elder Mays introduced his son to Piper Davis, the playing manager of the Black Barons. By 1948, Willie Mays was playing center field for the Black Barons as they won the Negro American League pennant. Birmingham lost the Negro World Series to the Homestead Grays in five games, falling 10-6 in 10 innings in Game 5 on Oct. 5, 1948, at Rickwood Field.

A year earlier, the Brooklyn Dodgers’ Jackie Robinson had integrated the Major Leagues, triggering the demise of the Negro Leagues, and although the Black Barons soldiered on until 1962, Mays was on his way to the big leagues.

“Every time I look at my pocketbook, I see Jackie Robinson,” Mays later said.

Giants manager Leo Durocher wrote that Giants scout Eddie Montague reported on Mays: “They got a kid playing center field practically barefooted that’s the best ballplayer I ever looked at. You better send somebody down there with a barrelful of money and grab this kid.”

Durocher did and, for a $4,000 signing bonus and a salary of $250 a month, beat the Giants’ big-league competitors to the teenager who would become The Sporting News’ MLB Player of the Decade for the 1960s.

In the minors, Mays played 81 games for the Trenton Giants of the Class B Interstate League in 1950 and 35 games for the Minneapolis Millers of the Class AAA American Association in 1951. In those 116 games for the New York farm teams, Mays hit .393 with a .604 slugging percentage.

Mays joined the New York Giants for his National League debut in their 37th game of the 1951 season and went on to win the NL Rookie of the Year Award.

A hitch in the U.S. Army limited Mays to 34 games in 1952 and caused him to miss the entire 1953 season. When he returned in 1954, he embarked on a practically unparalleled period of baseball excellence.

After his final game 20 seasons later, Mays had 2,068 runs, 3,293 hits, 525 doubles, 141 triples, 660 home runs, 1,909 RBIs and 339 stolen bases. In piling up those numbers, Mays won the National League Most Valuable Player Award in 1954 and 1965, led the Giants to a World Series victory in 1954 and made The Sporting News’ All-MLB team 10 times.

But numbers and accolades seem too cut and dried to contain the baseball ability of, as Mays’ National Baseball Hall of Fame plaque says, “one of baseball’s most colorful and exciting stars” whose collection of great catches and dashes for the plate always appeared to be accompanied by his cap flying off his head.

“There have been only two geniuses in the world,” Alabama-born actress Tallulah Bankhead said in 1962. “Willie Mays and Willie Shakespeare.”

At one time, only Babe Ruth had hit more MLB home runs than Mays, and he currently ranks sixth in baseball history. Mays is also fourth in total bases, seventh in runs, 12th in RBIs and 13th in hits on MLB’s all-time lists.

“As a batter, his only weakness is a wild pitch,” said Bill Rigney, a teammate of Mays with the New York Giants and his manager for five seasons, including the first three years of San Francisco Giants’ history.

In the field, 12 Gold Gloves stand as testimony to his ability, as does a play known simply in baseball circles as The Catch.

With the score tied 2-2 in Game 1 of the 1954 World Series and Cleveland runners on first and second with none out in the top of the eighth inning, Indians slugger Vic Wertz smashed a drive to deep center field in New York’s Polo Grounds. Playing center field for the Giants, Mays made an over-the-shoulder catch at least 420 feet from the plate, then whirled and whipped the baseball back to the infield, allowing only one runner to tag up and advance.

The Giants went on to win the game 5-2 in 10 innings on their way to sweeping Cleveland, which had set an MLB record by winning 72.1 percent of its regular-season games with a 111-43 record.

“I can’t very well tell my batters, ‘Don’t hit it to him,’” New York Mets manager Gil Hodges said about Mays’ range in the outfield. “Wherever they hit it, he’s there anyway.”

Mays made the National League squad for the MLB All-Star Game annually from 1954 through 1973. He won the game’s Most Valuable Player Award in 1963 and 1968. Mays has more All-Star Game runs, hits and stolen bases than any other player.

“They invented the All-Star Game for Willie Mays,” Hall of Famer Ted Williams said.

When Mays became eligible for the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1979, he received votes from 94.7 percent of the participating members of the Baseball Writers Association of America, the fourth-highest at that point for any inductee.

Mays summed up his baseball success simply: “They throw the ball, I hit it. They hit the ball, I catch it.”

The accolades for Mays have continued past his Hall of Fame enshrinement.

In 1999, Mays was chosen for MLB’s All-Century Team.

In 2007, Mays was chosen for the Rawlings All-Time Gold Glove Team and was the oldest of the nine players recognized.

In 2015, Mays received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.

In 2017, Major League Baseball renamed the World Series Most Valuable Player Award as the Willie Mays Award.

And on Feb. 4, 2024 – 2/4/24 – San Francisco celebrated Willie Mays Day for the Giants star who wore No. 24 on his jersey.

Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.