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Mickey Mantle: The Mick, The Commerce Comet
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00:00The following is a special presentation of the HBO Sports documentary series, Legends and Legacies.
00:11Hey, turn the quality up. I can't see. Thank you.
00:17Mantle didn't hide anything. You could see Mantle's whole life on his face.
00:30The fair-haired kid, playing baseball for the most storied franchise in the history of sports.
00:39He was perfect for that time period. He was the perfect fit.
00:45He wasn't larger than life. He was light.
00:50But yet he still had this aura about him that he was just like one of us.
00:55On the ball field, there was something very dignified and heroic about the way he carried himself.
01:05But Mickey's life overall was not always a study in dignity.
01:10A lot of sadness. There's a lot of regret.
01:14And there's a lot of tragedy involved.
01:18He was a stronger, bigger man when he knew he was dying than he ever was in life.
01:22He was a bad boy sometimes.
01:27But when he was good, he was very, very good.
01:35There you are.
01:37There was something dramatic about him coming out of the on-deck circle and walking toward home plate.
01:43There he was.
01:44Oh, gosh. No matter what you were doing, you automatically your eyes went right to him.
01:48You could hear this rumble through the stadium.
01:55And then the fury.
01:57He put his soul into every swing.
01:59All the muscles and the straining in his neck.
02:02He said, I put everything into my swing, including my teeth.
02:05One of the things about Mickey, there's always that potential, you know.
02:11You never quite knew.
02:15Something great was about to happen.
02:17It just exploded off the back.
02:19It looked like somebody had taken a gun and just shot a bullet right at the facade.
02:36You see how fast that ball disappeared when the footage they have him hitting it?
02:43That ball disappeared that fast in slow motion.
02:46He hit the damn ball.
02:50I could close my eyes and see the arrows showing the trajectory.
02:55374, 118, how high it was, where it hit, and how far it would have gone.
03:00They would bring in these scientists, rocket scientists, and say, well, if it would have cleared the stadium.
03:04That ball could have gone 700 feet.
03:06Maybe hit an alien on Mars and they'd have some cartoons, some extra-terrestrial, go, hey, where'd this come from?
03:12There was something about Manolet that screamed out, the natural.
03:19He's a god-made ball player.
03:23It stirs the imagination.
03:30You could make a case that no one in the history of sport ever fit a team, a town, a team.
03:42A team in sport, the New York Yankees.
03:49Mick, how would we do today out of the stadium?
03:51We won two games.
03:52How did you?
03:54Well, I got three hits.
03:56Three hits.
03:56You don't want to mention that one of them was a home run, do you?
03:58Number 41, ladies and gentlemen.
04:01He was humble and often shy.
04:04Attention made him uncomfortable, but he could not escape it.
04:07For a generation of adoring fans, everything Mickie did mattered.
04:14The way he smiled.
04:16The way he ran out his 536 home runs.
04:20The way he played 18 big league seasons through crippling injuries and late-night carousing.
04:26Well, no healthy legs after his rookie year.
04:36Even when his playing days passed and his three MVP awards and seven World Series championships had been committed to memory,
04:44those same people embraced the Mick's private struggles.
04:48Their childhood hero proved just as flawed and human as they were.
04:52To them, Mickie Mantle always mattered.
04:59He was a true American icon.
05:02Fair-haired, innocent, indestructible.
05:05But up close, he was blemished and vulnerable.
05:09An almost mythical character raised in the dust bowl at the height of the Great Depression.
05:14As far from the big city as one could get.
05:20There's Elsie's Cafe.
05:21That's where we ate dinner at.
05:22Commerce, Oklahoma.
05:23Down Main Street in Commerce was Highway 66.
05:29We could go down and sit on that rail and watch these people go by going to, I guess, California or New York.
05:36It wasn't stopping in Commerce.
05:37The vast majority of the people around here, somewhere or another, were attached to the mines.
05:48Mutt worked most of the time underground.
05:51He was what we all called a ground boss.
05:54They dug shafts.
05:56They may be 200 feet deep.
05:57They may be 450 feet deep.
06:01It was dangerous.
06:02There were lots of people killed.
06:04And most of the deaths...
06:07It was into that dark world of danger and death and the zinc mines of his hard-working father
06:17that Mickey Charles Mantle was born on October 20, 1931.
06:23He was the oldest child of Mutt and Lovell Mantle of Commerce, Oklahoma.
06:27A likable and mischievous kid from the start.
06:30He was a great kid.
06:32Everybody wanted to be around Mickey because he had good ideas about things to do.
06:38He'd come up with all these games that was fun for him, but not for sure everybody else in the game
06:43was having that much fun a lot of times, you know.
06:45He'd take us out to the chat files, and I had a BB gun.
06:53He'd line us up, count to ten.
06:55And we had to be in certain distance of the way, or we'd get it felted pretty good.
07:07I was a majorette in the band.
07:11He and his friends came to the football game.
07:13I thought Mick was the most handsome guy I ever saw.
07:15He had a crew cut, and he had the Commerce High football jacket on.
07:21They called him the Commerce Comet.
07:24He was fast and fearless, no matter which sport he played.
07:28But Mickey Mantle was born into baseball.
07:31He was named after his father's favorite player, Mickey Cochran,
07:35the Hall of Fame catcher from the Detroit Tigers.
07:39And with baseball in their blood, father and son formed an uncommon bond with the game and each other.
07:46The biggest thing in his life was when his dad took him to St. Louis to see the Cardinals.
07:55My dad didn't drive at probably 35 miles an hour.
07:59It was 300 miles to St. Louis.
08:04It took us more than a day to get there.
08:08Mickey would always say, Dad, I can run faster than you're going.
08:12He'd say, OK, get out.
08:13Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
08:16He certainly didn't want his children following in his footsteps.
08:22He wanted Mickey to have a better...
08:27But was very serious about his training in Mickey.
08:35Dad got off work at 4 o'clock.
08:40Mickey had to be here every day.
08:43He'd always be right here as soon as his dad got home.
08:51It was trouble, big trouble.
08:52He wasn't there on time.
08:57They had a little old plate down there.
09:00He'd stand up to the plate.
09:03They'd practice it until you couldn't see.
09:08He would pitch right-handed, and my granddad would pitch left-handed to him.
09:11He was teaching Mickey how to switch hit.
09:17He got to where he could hit a lot of home runs.
09:19He'd get hit and play.
09:20And we did get to chase the ball around on the other side of the house when they went over there.
09:24You never seen him without a baseball bat.
09:30They played for hours and hours.
09:32They were obsessed.
09:38Mutt was pretty hard on him.
09:40Mick told me, I could do really, really good in a ball game, and Dad never said, you did well.
09:44He said, you can do better.
09:46That really made Mick try even harder to please him.
09:52He didn't have done anything in the world for his father.
09:56Soon after high school, Mantle signed a contract with the New York Yankees.
10:01In the minors, he was an erratic shortstop, but he could hit.
10:04In his second year at Chaplin, Missouri, Mantle led the Class C Western Association,
10:10batting .383 with 26 homers and 136 runs batted in.
10:15Nice.
10:16He was proving to be quite a bargain.
10:20Tom Greenway was really the only scout he talked with.
10:26He said, I'll give you a Yankee contract with an $1,100.
10:29$1,100.
10:34That's it.
10:38Mantle came to the Yankees in 51.
10:41Casey Stengel, the manager of the Yankees, promoted him, talked about him endlessly through
10:47that first spring training.
10:51There was a tremendous dynamism about Mantle.
10:55He was like a runaway Mustang.
10:58I think he could do it all.
10:59He could run.
11:01Oh boy, could he run.
11:05He could hit.
11:06They said, watch this kid.
11:08He could run like a deer.
11:09One morning, they were going to see how fast everybody was.
11:13They lined up all the outfielders.
11:16He ran.
11:17It looked like the other guys were standing still.
11:20We found out he could run like a deer.
11:23Where did this guy come from?
11:26Mantle looked like the kid that delivered your paper.
11:28The high noon sun.
11:29The hayseed from Oklahoma, literally carrying a $7 suitcase.
11:37He's the caricature of the bumpkin looking up at the skyscrapers.
11:42And the head keeps going up and up.
11:43We stayed at the Concourse Plaza Hotel, and we got to be very good friends.
11:54I was 19 years old, and he was 18 years old.
11:57We had dress codes, and Mickey would buy some lousy ties.
12:00We ate a lot of hot dogs and cheeseburgers or pizza.
12:03We didn't know what the hell to do.
12:04It wasn't just off the field that Mantle had trouble.
12:10After a dazzling spring and a hot start to the 51 season, Mickey struggled.
12:16Maybe the Yanks had made a mistake in sewing the number six to his uniform.
12:20A not-so-subtle hint that he was expected to follow in the mythic footsteps of numbers three through five,
12:26the last of whom was entering his final season.
12:32He never had time to settle in.
12:35The moment he set foot in Yankee Stadium,
12:39the first day, he was the heir, the successor,
12:43to Ruth and Gehrig and DiMaggio.
12:46Boy, that's a load.
12:48And he came to the plate.
12:49Wait a second.
12:49He's supposed to be the next great one,
12:52but he doesn't play that way.
12:53He makes mistakes.
12:54He strikes out too much,
12:56and watching him kick his glove and break his helmet
12:59and show temper and pout things they never saw from the great DiMaggio
13:02was a very, very hard transition for Yankee fans.
13:06You're striking out and people calling you a bum go back to Oklahoma.
13:12Joe really never was friendly with Mick,
13:15and never really tried to make him welcome to the team.
13:18When Mickie came with the Yankees in 51,
13:21Joe DiMaggio didn't talk to him for half a season.
13:26Having the fans and the media put on him
13:30the burden of the great Yankee icon just overwhelmed him.
13:38On July 15th, manager Casey Stengel told a still-struggling mantle
13:42he was being sent to the minors in Kansas City.
13:46There, Mickie's hitting troubles continued.
13:47But by fate, he was just a short drive from Oklahoma and his father, Mutt.
13:54He was down in the dumps.
13:56His dad decided he should go to Kansas City and visit with him, and did.
14:00And when he got there Mick told him, he said, I think I may as well quit, I think I may as well give up the game.
14:09Give him a real good tongue lashing.
14:12If that's all the guts you have, then get your stuff together, we'll go home.
14:18I'll put you to work in the mines, you can do that the rest of your life, just like I'm done.
14:24He wanted his dad to sympathize with him, and he did not.
14:27Now, Mickie never worked in the mines, and I'm sure his father never worked in the mines again.
14:43I'll put him back in the mines, and he said, I want you to quit acting like a baby, and get out there and play ball like you can.
14:55And that bristled him up, and boy, he went back there, and I mean, he started hitting that ball.
15:09It's 1951, with the less daunting number seven on his back.
15:13But New York's love affair with Mickie Mantle began.
15:17In his first 14 seasons, the Yanks went to 12 World Series, winning seven.
15:21A powerful switch hitter with blinding speed, Mantle was at his best in the mid-50s.
15:27In 1956, he won the first of his consecutive MVP awards, as well as the Triple Crown.
15:34At a time when television brought baseball into the living room, Mantle was a star of stars.
15:41The magnificent Mickie, just 20 years old.
15:46As a liner, the left center for a base hit.
15:48Here comes Mickie, the rounding third, coming in to score.
15:51Mantle backing up, and makes the catch.
15:54That ball is going, going, it is gone!
15:57Yankee Stadium, Madison Avenue, Main Street.
16:02The Mick was popular everywhere.
16:04Women loved him, men admired him, and every kid wanted to grow up to be just like him.
16:10If you're going to build a baseball player from scratch, you'd go, just forget the plans, him.
16:18Just make it him.
16:22He could do everything.
16:24He was so fast.
16:25The power was amazing.
16:29When you're a little kid, you went, oh my god.
16:32It was a comet with a hat on.
16:34There was a fury.
16:37There was an explosiveness that was very, very appealing.
16:41Mantle brought an energy, and just brought a wildness to the plate.
16:49Mantle's at bats were explosions.
16:51Boom!
16:52They lost it over the fence in right field.
16:54The ball was up.
16:55Meow!
16:55And there it goes, across Bedford Avenue, and deep into a parking lot.
17:05And what was sort of...
17:06That swing is crisp, and the run is crisp.
17:14He was crisp.
17:15What ironic is that occasionally, he would lay down a butt.
17:25Mantle's speed was part of what Mantle was.
17:29I mean, he was extraordinary.
17:31Getting down to first base, getting around the bases.
17:34You just count sometimes how great a fielder he was.
17:46Nicky outranked the ball.
17:47He was that fast.
17:50I think this year I'd rather leave the league in runs back in, home runs, and hitting.
17:54And that's not going for this year.
17:57He was such a leader, it picked you up as a team.
18:05You know you can never be on his level.
18:09But you can try.
18:12But buddy, I'm going to tell you one thing.
18:14You tried.
18:16See?
18:18You broke your fanny trying to equal him.
18:21He was one of those players who wasn't just good.
18:25He made you feel good, you're just watching.
18:29There's talent.
18:32But then there's just his...
18:33He was dashing, he was handsome.
18:41And he was graceful.
18:42He had a voice look about him all the time, and a great smile.
18:46And he smiled a lot.
18:50And you saw Mickey Mantle, and you liked him.
18:54It all shucks, part of his personality.
18:56He was very endearing.
18:58When I come up to the big leagues, I was a shuffling, grinning, head-ducking country boy.
19:03That charming drawl, that country boy bullshit, it was great, you know?
19:07Ha-ha.
19:08And he was absolutely ripped.
19:11He stretched those pinstripes to their limits in his upper body.
19:16Don't say anything gay this time.
19:18I know steroids.
19:19He didn't need steroids.
19:22In fact, we didn't know how to spell it back then.
19:24Oh yeah, steroids didn't get to the game for another 25, 30 years.
19:32It was Coke that got to the game first.
19:35He was the first person that you saw in your life who was bigger than one.
19:39He saw him.
19:46Mantle and Wheaties says...
19:48I'd like to point out nobody ever saw or Mantle.
19:51A lot of people saw him, though.
19:53He'd be on everything.
19:59He'd be here, he'd be there.
20:01He was so big, he actually did an ad for cigarettes.
20:06And also for not smoking.
20:09He did one for smoking and one for not smoking.
20:11Must have been a couple of hundred bucks here or there.
20:14I'll do it.
20:14Now, tough words from perhaps the finest baseball player the world has ever known.
20:17Mickey Mantle.
20:18I want my maple.
20:20I want my maple.
20:23Mickey called me up a couple of weeks after the commercial was running.
20:26George, what a pain of your ass.
20:28I said, what's the matter?
20:29Wherever I go, the kids are yelling at me.
20:31I want my maple.
20:32I want my maple.
20:33I want my maple.
20:35Connected to him.
20:36To be a part of it.
20:38It was absolute myopic here at worship.
20:43He was the most important thing in our lives.
20:48Kids were painting number seven on their t-shirts.
20:51Everybody had his righty and lefty batting stance down pat.
20:55We all tried to run like Mickey.
21:04It looked like he was a piston.
21:06His arms went up and down and said it this way.
21:10We.
21:10I used to fake knee injuries when I was a kid.
21:14I learned how to long divide so I could know his batting average because I wanted to know
21:18what he was hitting when I went to bed.
21:20I wrote a poem about him when I was like 10 or 11 or something.
21:25From a pinstripe shirt his arms do come.
21:28Like massive stone they appear to some.
21:31For these are arms that compare with few.
21:34When a normal man wanted to make two and it kind of went on for a while.
21:40Even when he'd be out at first base the way he would reach behind his helmet and scoop
21:47off his batting helmet from the rear and toss it to the bat boy so elegant nobody could do
21:57it like the Mick.
21:58Even the name Mickey man just flows.
22:02When people said that name over and over again.
22:06Mickey.
22:07Mano.
22:08Mickey.
22:09Mantle.
22:09Mickey.
22:10Mantle.
22:11Mickey.
22:11Mantle.
22:12Mickey.
22:12Mantle.
22:12Mickey.
22:13Mantle.
22:13Mickey.
22:13Mickey.
22:14Mickey.
22:14Mantle.
22:14Let's go and watch Mickey Mantle.
22:16I'm just glad his name wasn't Cy Schwarzstein.
22:20When you say Mickey Mantle you're saying baseball.
22:28A regular guy.
22:30He just did the little things all the time and he just had this little smirk on his face.
22:36We were getting ready to go out and Mickey had just combed his hair and he looked at the
22:40mirror and he said.
22:40Pull your hands away.
22:42You know because he knew I walked in the room and it was going to get a laugh from me.
22:47He had a tremendous sense of humor.
22:49I was the first guy to be hair drying at a clubhouse.
22:51He put powder in it one day.
22:53I turned it on.
22:53I turned white.
22:54You know that was Mantle.
22:55He didn't want to be a hero.
22:58He just wanted to be Mickey and one of the guys.
23:04Try as he might it was impossible for Mickey Mantle to be just one of anything let alone one of the guys.
23:11His God-given ability and almost accidental charm set him apart.
23:16He was a baseball star who eventually became as comfortable and dynamic off the field as he was on it.
23:23His eyes were so big and so wide open he quickly learned that there was a lot of fun to be had in New York City.
23:36The other Yankee players took his gee whiz attitude and they said alright kid we're going to show you the big town.
23:44And they took him to the nightclubs in New York to the Copacabana to the Latin Quarter.
23:49And he became a regular at Tootshore's restaurant.
23:55They'd go out and hang out at Tootshore with Sinatra.
24:00They felt like they were special.
24:03Like they owned that town.
24:05Watch a movie from the 50s.
24:07The star of the show's got a cigarette in one hand and a drink in the other.
24:11It was cool to drink.
24:13They drink and they chase women.
24:15We always had something to do.
24:20At about 11 o'clock I said I'm going home.
24:24I said I have to catch tomorrow.
24:27You guys do what you want.
24:29Wait till you talk to Whitey.
24:31He'll tell you some stories.
24:33They've all been told a hundred times and I have nothing new to add to it.
24:40Bottles of beer all over the place.
24:41So he'd have two or three just to replenish his fluids.
24:43Well he's already got a buzz on me.
24:44He said well I was drunk before I left the ballpark.
24:47Then I'd go out and have a couple of drinks and dinner.
24:48Now I'm really plastic.
24:50They wanted me to stabilize him.
24:52Well there wasn't much I could do with him.
24:55We knew there were nights that he was out.
24:57He'd walk in the clubhouse and Hank Bauer and I would say oh god.
25:01Because we could check his eyes that we probably had a bad night.
25:04Which some of us did in the old days.
25:07One night.
25:08No no no no no no no no.
25:10They had a very good night.
25:13We were in New Jersey with Yogi Berra and his wife.
25:16Mick was really having fun.
25:18And as we drove out of the parking lot Yogi screams Merlin I wouldn't ride.
25:25Concussion because I hit the windshield.
25:28I could have been killed.
25:29Along the way it got out of control.
25:31Yeah and of course Mick had a lot of time to spend in New York by himself because I wasn't there.
25:39Merlin Johnson and Mickey Mantle were childhood sweethearts.
25:42Who married soon after Mickey's rookie season of 1951.
25:47Two years later when Mickey Jr. was born.
25:50The family bought a home in Dallas.
25:53Merlin settled there.
25:55While Mickey spent most of his time in New York.
25:57As the years passed and the family grew Mickey continued to drift away.
26:02Leaving Merlin with the responsibility of raising their four young sons.
26:07Mantle was a distant father.
26:09The baseball star who never grew up.
26:13Of course the Yankees clubhouse of that era was just like Neverland.
26:18With Billy Martin as its Peter Pan.
26:21One of their teammates had a real beautiful girl in Cleveland.
26:24Dad and Mickey got home from the clubs and so they had enough liquid courage in them.
26:29They decide they're going to climb around and peek in their teammates window to see this beautiful girl.
26:35There's about a two foot ledge around the building.
26:37I believe they're on the seventh or eighth floor.
26:40They decide to climb out the window.
26:42Mickey's leading the way.
26:43They end up having to go all the way around the corner.
26:47Luck has it.
26:49The shades are drawn.
26:50Come on Billy, let's go back.
26:52Says Nick and my father tells Mickey that he can't.
26:56There's no way he's going to be able to turn around and go back the other way.
27:00And they have to continue to walk all the way around the hotel to climb back in the window.
27:10Where Mickey was introverted, my father was extroverted.
27:14When they were just so close, they would become like brothers.
27:16Mickey got a great kick out of Billy's pugnacious personality.
27:26And what you did when you were a friend of Billy Martin was go out and drink and raise hell.
27:31When I was a kid.
27:36Fights at the Copacabana and they would be partying.
27:39And then the next day they'd win 17-0.
27:43Yeah.
27:43Turned to me.
27:50Hey Blanche.
27:51He said, do you ever think about dying?
27:53What?
27:54I said, are you really concerned about that?
27:57He said, yeah.
28:01Mantle's fears were far from unfounded.
28:04Early death was in his blood.
28:07When he was 13, he watched his grandfather die from Hodgkin's disease.
28:10Two of his uncles were also taken young, each before the age of 35, again from Hodgkin's.
28:19Mickey was convinced he would meet the same fate.
28:22Especially when he watched firsthand, his father begin to succumb to that same horrible disease during a bittersweet World Series visit.
28:31It's a shame.
28:32He came to the World Series the first time he ever saw me play baseball in New York.
28:37He came to the Series in 1951 and that's why I hurt my name.
28:40He called him late.
28:49He slipped on that drainage thing out in the right center field.
28:55He just absolutely stopped flat like this.
29:03I turned around to him like, oh, he's dead.
29:05He was taking me to the hospital the next morning.
29:09When I got out of the cab, I couldn't walk and I was leaning on him and he just keeled over.
29:13And that's the first time I had known he was sick.
29:18Mantle watched the rest of his first World Series in a hospital room, out with torn cartilage in his knee.
29:24In the bed next to him was his dad, who over the next six months deteriorated at the hands of the Mantle family curse.
29:34His dad could not lay down.
29:36He could not sit down.
29:37He was in excruciating pain.
29:39It was sad.
29:40He didn't last too long after that.
29:44He passed away the next May after that World Series.
29:50When my dad died, he said, well,
29:52it might be a little rough, but we'll make it.
30:00I don't know what we would have done if it hadn't been for Mickey
30:03after dad died, because
30:06there was us four kids
30:08still at home.
30:10But we got a check every time he got paid.
30:13I mean, he was terrified
30:17of getting Hodgkin's disease.
30:22It just never was the same for Mick.
30:25Because he needed him so much.
30:28I've lived without a dad since 15.
30:30Mickey was 18.
30:31So I know that feeling.
30:32I know that,
30:33plus when you do something great,
30:34you want to pick up the phone and say,
30:36hey,
30:36you want to look in the stands and see him go.
30:39When you don't have it,
30:40it's a big hole.
30:41And you either come to grips with it
30:42and value the good times.
30:45Or you remain this hurt little kid
30:48and do stuff to make it try to disappear.
30:52And that's what he tried to do.
30:54This young kid inherits fear.
30:58He inherits, I'm next.
31:00He inherits a death sentence.
31:02I'm going to die before I'm 40.
31:04That fear drove him to despair.
31:07It drove him to the bottle.
31:08It drove him to...
31:10Who gives a shit?
31:12I'm a dead man.
31:16Mickey Mantle lived the rest of his life
31:18with emotional and physical pain.
31:21It was difficult to tell which took more of a toll.
31:23Although it's hard to imagine
31:25how he played at all
31:26with 15 bone fractures
31:28over the course of his career.
31:30God.
31:30He played with every kind of
31:32imaginable injury
31:34that an athlete could possibly have.
31:39He played 18 seasons.
31:44So we had an injury nearly every season.
31:49He was playing center field.
31:50He couldn't raise up his arm,
31:51but nobody knew it
31:52except the trainer and the ball players.
31:55If you know Mantle,
31:57he was going to play
31:58if he could walk on one leg.
32:01And I don't know how he could do it,
32:03but he was hurt all the time.
32:06Despite his injuries in the early 1960s,
32:09Mickey Mantle was still a great player
32:11on a great team.
32:13The Yanks were in the World Series
32:15each year from 1960 to 1964
32:17and won in 1961 and 62.
32:23In 61,
32:23he challenged Babe Ruth's
32:25single-season home run record.
32:28And in 62,
32:29he won his third MVP award.
32:31In the 64 World Series,
32:33Mantle hit three homers,
32:35raising his total
32:36to a World Series record 18,
32:38including the winner in Game 3.
32:41It was his last great October moment
32:43as decades of Yankee dominance
32:46came to a sudden end.
32:47Do you enjoy baseball any more now
32:50than when you first broke in?
32:53I enjoy it just as much.
32:56I get a bigger kick out of hitting home runs now
32:58and it seemed like we'd win a lot more
33:00and when we win a game now,
33:01it's a lot of fun.
33:02After averaging 37 home runs a year
33:08his previous 10 seasons,
33:10Mickey Mantle
33:11to bat 300,
33:16the Mick was a 250 hitter
33:17his final years in pinstripes.
33:19It was as painful to watch
33:21as it had become for him to play.
33:23He used to wrap himself every day,
33:25you know, both legs
33:26all the way up to the thigh
33:27down to the anchor
33:28with these big, thick, cushioned wraps.
33:34He'd take that big swing
33:35and go down on one knee like that
33:36and you'd just feel the pain, you know.
33:38Yeah, it was tough.
33:43He'd run into third base
33:44and like sort of tip-toe
33:45because he couldn't come to a sudden stop.
33:48He can use the slide.
33:51What's he doing at first base?
33:53He'd want to win so bad.
33:57I've seen him go 0 for 4
33:59and we'd lose by one run
34:00and he'd go down and stop crying.
34:04And he raised my idol down here crying
34:06and it was sad.
34:09You could feel that he was going down.
34:14It's never depicted more precisely
34:16than Mother's Day 67
34:19when he hits the 500th home run
34:21on what is he?
34:22Watch him run around the bases.
34:25He's...
34:25He looks like he's about to trip and fall.
34:28He's probably...
34:30like this.
34:32Running around the bases.
34:33Dank.
34:34Early spring day.
34:36Come on, there's a goal!
34:37There's a goal!
34:38There's a goal!
34:40Watch him go around the bases that day.
34:42Nicky, how long do you think you'll be playing?
34:50Well, I hope I can play another two or three years.
34:53I'd like to hit 600 home runs
34:55and I need about 85 more,
34:57so that's why it will take a long time.
34:59Mantle never did come anywhere near
35:03hitting that 600th home run.
35:06During spring training in 1969,
35:08he announced his retirement,
35:10simply saying,
35:11I can't play anymore.
35:13I have to quit.
35:13He tumbled a 237 in his final season.
35:20He lost his lifetime 300 average that year.
35:25And that was his great regret,
35:26was hitting 298 lifetime.
35:28He says,
35:28I was a 300 hitter.
35:30I've ever had,
35:37on this hallowed baseball ground,
35:40the magnificent Yankee,
35:42the great number seven,
35:45Mickey Mantle.
35:51I've often wondered how a man
35:53who knew he was going to die
35:55could stand here and say
35:56that he was the luckiest man in the world.
35:58But now I think I know
36:00how Lou Gehrig felt.
36:06I'll never forget it.
36:08God bless you all
36:09and thank you very much.
36:17Mickey was a lost child
36:19without baseball.
36:23And he had nightmares.
36:26And one...
36:28Wait, why?
36:28He was always trying to leg out
36:30an infield hit.
36:33And he never got it.
36:34Never made it.
36:38The other dream he had was
36:39he was late getting to the ballpark.
36:42He heard his name being called.
36:44He couldn't find a gate that was open.
36:46And he could see Billy and Yogi and Whitey.
36:55And he was trying to crawl through this fence.
36:58And he got caught at the hips
36:59and couldn't get through.
37:01Then he'd wake up.
37:03He always felt he didn't do well enough.
37:05The image of his father just looking down saying,
37:09you screwed up, kid.
37:10You screwed up.
37:13He never could be what his father wanted for him
37:15or expected of him.
37:18It just wasn't good enough.
37:19There was always a sadness, I thought, about him.
37:25A wistfulness about him.
37:32Any knowledgeable person who saw Mattel at his best
37:34would tell you that Mickey Mattel
37:36was one of the ten best non-pitchers
37:38who ever breathed.
37:40But no matter how great he was,
37:41he felt he did not achieve all he should have achieved.
37:44He thought he truly had a chance to come close
37:46to being what Babe Ruth had been.
37:48He just felt like he had dissipated so much
37:51just off the field.
37:53Lack of sleep, too much carousing.
37:56Now he's as much to blame for that as fate may be.
37:59But...
37:59What could I have?
38:06I blame Joe DiMaggio.
38:08He called him late.
38:11He got injured on a drainpipe on his rookie year.
38:16He'd have 600 home runs
38:20and a 300 batting average is not for that.
38:27Guaranteed.
38:28I've been.
38:33People, what are you going to do now that you're retired?
38:36I said, go look for a job.
38:39Mickey, it's the same thing.
38:40He didn't have any money.
38:41I'm not a mental heavyweight, you know,
38:43and I was a little bit worried of how I was going to make money.
38:46How could he go broke?
38:48He had several businesses.
38:50He tried to run a restaurant.
38:52He was in an employment business with Joe Namath.
38:55But none of them were satisfying emotionally
38:58and none of them were businesses
39:00where he made a great deal of money.
39:01After his career ended in ball
39:07is when it really started getting bad.
39:09Because, I mean, a lot of his jobs,
39:12you know, after he retired,
39:13were cocktail parties, banquets.
39:15People always expected him,
39:17hey, have a drink.
39:18You know, have a drink.
39:21That's how he dealt with the people.
39:24He was a shy person.
39:25A few drinks.
39:26And he was alive for the party.
39:27Party, if we'd have had a great tasting beer
39:30that was less filling in the old days,
39:32can you imagine where we'd be now?
39:34Yeah, the beer drink is Hall of Fame.
39:38Over time, Mantle used the bottle
39:40to grow closer to the kids he once neglected.
39:43It was a desperate attempt to make up for lost time.
39:47He and the boys who were now grown
39:48had become drinking buddies.
39:51The alcohol actually helped us
39:54build a relationship that we'd never really had.
39:57Because that's how we got together.
39:59He said that he felt
40:01it was kind of like having
40:02Whitey and Billy with him.
40:06It did build our relationship,
40:08and so we loved it.
40:10It was all fun and glory.
40:12Hey, where can we go next?
40:13What can we drink next?
40:14How much can we drink next?
40:16Looking back on it,
40:16that was not a way to get to know somebody,
40:19especially your father.
40:20He just felt like that's the only way
40:21we could get close to him.
40:23Yeah, those are his sons.
40:24I never felt
40:27that we did have that connection
40:29as children.
40:34He couldn't come to our games
40:36because people would bother him.
40:38He would have to sit in the car
40:39and watch the games.
40:40Sometimes we wouldn't even know he was there.
40:42One time he took us to
40:46the Harlem Globetrotters.
40:49We were there five or ten minutes
40:50and people just started hounding him and stuff,
40:52and we just had to get up and leave.
40:55When Dad was home,
40:57we would have backyard football games.
40:59You could see in my dad
41:00that he enjoyed it,
41:01but he didn't really know
41:03how to express himself as a father.
41:05And a lot of it was he was gone.
41:08We didn't know this guy
41:09that was this huge personality.
41:13It was a hard childhood
41:14because our mom raised us.
41:17I spent most of my life alone.
41:20They never had the company of their dad.
41:23They did not have the discipline.
41:25It got pretty difficult,
41:26and they all began to be teenagers.
41:28I took my first drink at 13 or something.
41:33We did so much partying,
41:35it's not even funny.
41:37I was doing drugs then,
41:38doing cocaine, drinking,
41:40and I was pretty out of it.
41:42We put ourselves in some very stupid
41:43and dangerous, idiotic situations.
41:46I see.
41:47I was living with five active alcoholics.
41:50I was one crazy lady.
41:51I had four kids and Mick.
41:54I never felt at home anywhere.
41:57Never felt comfortable anywhere after baseball
41:59because he was never in his element.
42:02He always felt like there were no strings attached.
42:04He treated himself like he was a free agent out there
42:07doing whatever he wanted to do.
42:09By the early 1980s,
42:11Mantle's life had become a mess.
42:13His family and marriage washed out in a drunken haze.
42:17Professionally, he was going nowhere.
42:20In 1983, he was briefly banned from baseball
42:23for taking a job at a casino in Atlantic City.
42:25He had no choice.
42:28He needed the money.
42:31Billy Martin.
42:35Did you get that trap shot?
42:37But he would soon find a new and profitable way
42:39to capitalize on his fame.
42:41Don't film the putt.
42:42This incredible memorabilia era began
42:46in which people would pay money
42:48for a Mickey Mantle shirt,
42:50for an autographed ball.
42:52He said,
42:53boy, if I had known that,
42:54I would have saved all my dirty jocks.
42:57But he did make a great deal of money,
43:00which really changed his life.
43:02I thought he was one of the funniest people I'd ever met.
43:04And I think that was one of the things
43:06that really attracted me to Mickey,
43:08was his sense of humor.
43:09In providing funds to young researchers,
43:11as well as the more established,
43:13the Deafness Research Foundation...
43:15What you said?
43:16Hear these motherfuckers going down...
43:18One good thing about being deaf,
43:23you don't have to listen to that shit, right?
43:27During the memorabilia craze,
43:30Mickey hired Greer Johnson,
43:31a business manager,
43:33who helped organize his resurgent career.
43:36Mantle's autograph
43:37had become the most sought after in the industry.
43:40Johnson also became the new woman in his life.
43:44A life which had now become
43:45increasingly like his old one.
43:48Once again, Mickey Mantle
43:53found himself on center stage,
43:55dealing with the spotlight.
43:58In his playing days,
43:59Mantle could be difficult
44:00with his fans and the media.
44:02He was uncomfortable with the attention
44:04and struggled to understand it.
44:06As a middle-aged ex-ball player
44:08with no heroics left to provide,
44:10his incomprehension turned to resentment.
44:13We'd see people come up for an autograph,
44:15and I'm talking about 40, 45-year-old men.
44:18Oh, my God, that's Mickey.
44:22Grown men would cry.
44:23Literally, tears would come down their cheek
44:26when they would meet Mickey.
44:27I mean, it was almost like a revelation.
44:30It was almost like a religious experience
44:32to these people.
44:33And Mickey just, you know,
44:36he just didn't understand that.
44:38He never really understood
44:40why he was beloved,
44:42why an adult male like me,
44:45I'd walk into a room,
44:46and if he were there,
44:47I'd sweat,
44:48and I'd follow him like I'm six.
44:49He didn't aspire to that.
44:55He didn't pretend to be anything
44:57but a kid from Commerce, Oklahoma.
45:01Why do they love me so much?
45:03I just play bleepin' baseball.
45:06He tried everything in his power
45:11to undo that.
45:14God damn.
45:15I don't give a shit about the hair.
45:17Let's get this over with, all right?
45:19Sorry.
45:19Hmm.
45:19Look at the hair.
45:26It may have been the liquor talking,
45:28but the hero his fans still worshipped
45:30had become a broken and bitter man.
45:34I walked up to Mickey Mantle
45:36and introduced myself.
45:38I'm probably one of the first kids
45:39in this country named after you,
45:41born in 1953.
45:43Mickey Mantle was so drunk,
45:44he looked at me,
45:45and he said,
45:47you know what, kid?
45:47You know how many kids in this country
45:49are named after Mickey Mantle?
45:51He said, go away.
45:52Don't bother me.
45:53No way.
45:53More often than not,
45:54he was an unattractive drunk,
45:57and you winced
45:58when he acted boorishly or worse
46:00toward other people.
46:02You wanted to climb onto the table.
46:04After four decades of abuse,
46:06Mantle realized he had hit bottom.
46:09In 1994,
46:10he finally reached out for help
46:12after admiring the courage
46:13of a close friend
46:14and a member of his family.
46:16And we found out
46:17that it was a little leap for that.
46:19I had been drinking
46:2017 years at this point,
46:22and so I took the initiative
46:24and checked myself
46:25into Betty Ford's.
46:26I didn't even tell anybody
46:27in my family
46:28that I was going.
46:31He was scared to death.
46:32He didn't want to admit
46:33he was an alcoholic.
46:34Nobody does.
46:36After I got back
46:37to Betty Ford's center,
46:38he started asking me questions
46:39about what it was like,
46:40and I knew eventually
46:42he was going to say to me,
46:43can you get me in?
46:45And that ultimately
46:46is what he said.
46:46You could see Mantle's
46:49whole life on his face.
46:53Mantle left the Betty Ford Clinic
46:54with a vow to stay sober.
46:56But his will was promptly tested
46:58when his son, Billy,
47:00who had battled both Hodgkin's
47:02and drug abuse,
47:03died of a heart attack
47:04at 36.
47:05Soon after,
47:07Mantle went public
47:08with his guilt,
47:09his shame,
47:11and his lost opportunity.
47:13Because he was a public figure
47:16in a different way
47:18than the kind of cheap celebrity
47:19that's everywhere,
47:20he perceived some responsibility
47:22to tell his story.
47:24I had to write my dad,
47:25who's been dead since 1951,
47:28I had to write him a letter,
47:29things that I didn't do for him.
47:32I wasn't there for my kids
47:33like my dad was for me.
47:35You talk about something
47:36that's hard to do,
47:37that's really hard.
47:39But I need to tell him I love.
47:43It's tough to face.
47:45What do you have in life,
47:46ultimately?
47:46It's your family.
47:49He said once he wrote
47:50that letter to his dad,
47:51it made it easier for him
47:53to express himself to us.
47:55When you got to Betty Ford Clinic,
47:58you received more letters
47:59than anyone has ever been.
48:01I really didn't realize
48:02until I started getting those letters
48:04what I did mean to some people.
48:07Let's hope you've got a lot of years
48:09left to continue to write chapters
48:11in your life.
48:12What do you hope for?
48:13I hope the people at the end
48:15will say,
48:17he turned out all right.
48:18I'm proud that I named
48:21my son Mickey.
48:22That would be nice.
48:26That was the beginning
48:27of his life, really.
48:32In an acknowledgement,
48:33Mickey Mantle was at peace
48:35for perhaps the first time
48:36in his life.
48:38Over the next 18 months,
48:39he embraced sobriety
48:41and became a better,
48:42happier man
48:43than he'd ever been.
48:44He proved he could
48:45overcome drinking,
48:47but in the end,
48:48not the abuse on his body
48:49the drinking had caused.
48:52Mickey was sick,
48:53in need of a new liver,
48:55and after just two days
48:56of waiting,
48:58one was found.
48:59His liver tests
49:00were getting worse,
49:00and if he hadn't gotten
49:01transplanted when he did,
49:03he wouldn't have lasted
49:04another week.
49:05Mickey Mantle went into surgery
49:06about 4.30 this morning
49:07local time.
49:08The liver transplant operation
49:09is expected to last
49:11four to six hours.
49:12Once the surgery was over,
49:15the whole question
49:16that we had anticipated...
49:19They said,
49:20oh, he got favorable treatment
49:22like right there.
49:23He said he got
49:23favorable treatment.
49:26He was the quickest
49:27because he was the sickest.
49:32Did you pass other patients
49:34to do him?
49:35Why did you get one
49:36so quickly?
49:37There are a lot of people
49:38out there who absolutely
49:39believe to this day
49:40no matter what facts
49:41they hear.
49:42They believe that Mickey Mantle
49:43got preferential treatment.
49:46But I am here to tell you
49:47that I was there,
49:48and I know that he didn't.
49:51The donor's information
49:51was input into the computer,
49:53blood group, body size,
49:54that sort of thing.
49:54And when the list popped out,
49:57Mickey Mantle's name
49:57was first.
49:58As soon as he was
49:59physically able,
50:01Mickey Mantle was moved
50:02to make a public plea
50:03as memorable as any
50:05of his mammoth home runs.
50:06There is a sense of tragedy,
50:11a beat-up Wayne Mickey Mantle,
50:14but he wanted to send
50:15a message.
50:16I would like to say
50:17to the kids out there
50:19to take a good,
50:20you talk about a role model,
50:23this is a role model,
50:24don't be like me.
50:25You know?
50:26I mean,
50:27God gave me a body,
50:29an ability to play baseball,
50:31and that's what I wanted to do.
50:32It was just wasted.
50:34I was given so much.
50:37My blood.
50:41The famous line
50:43that he always used,
50:44oh, you think it started
50:45out as a joke,
50:46but he said,
50:47if you'd have known
50:47he was going to live that long,
50:48you'd have taken
50:49better care of yourself.
50:50He said,
50:50I did things wrong,
50:52and he says,
50:52I made mistakes.
50:53Don't live like I did.
50:56He wanted people to know
50:58that he woke up
50:59and saw the mistake he made,
51:02and that wasn't any way
51:03to live your life.
51:04As a son,
51:04it was just very uplifting.
51:06I want to start
51:07giving something back.
51:08It seems to me like
51:09all I've done is just take.
51:12He had the heart of a lion.
51:14He was so brave
51:15that it just made you thrilled
51:17to just know him.
51:18I think that took more courage
51:20than anything.
51:21It was a great message
51:22to the kids.
51:25In my mind,
51:26he's as strong
51:26in a baddest box
51:27and as sturdy of leg
51:28as he's ever been
51:29in his life.
51:31And he faced it
51:32with more strength
51:33and more courage
51:35than he may have even thought
51:36that he had himself.
51:37It was his greatest hour.
51:39It was his greatest message.
51:40Because that had
51:41some effect on people.
51:44It's Mantle.
51:44You know,
51:45it's the Mick.
51:45And, you know,
51:46he's on TV telling
51:47millions of people,
51:48I helped myself
51:48too little too late.
51:50But what he did do
51:51was help thousands,
51:52if not millions,
51:53of other people
51:53think twice about
51:54letting their lives
51:55get out of control.
51:59Intent on making amends
52:00for a life he felt
52:01he'd thrown away,
52:02Mantle started
52:03a foundation
52:04to raise awareness
52:04of the importance
52:05of organ donation.
52:07Its impact was immediate
52:08as donations increased
52:10across the country.
52:13Mantle looked forward
52:14to witnessing
52:15the creation
52:15of a new legacy,
52:17a heroism
52:17he could understand,
52:19saving lives.
52:21But it wasn't to be.
52:23During his liver transplant,
52:25doctors had found cancer.
52:27At first,
52:28they believed
52:29it was treatable.
52:30But within a month,
52:31they realized
52:32they faced
52:32an unusually aggressive strain.
52:34of cancer in my lungs.
52:37Hi, this is Mick.
52:38About two weeks ago,
52:40the doctors found
52:41a couple of spots
52:42of cancer in my lungs.
52:43I'm hoping to get back
52:44to feeling as good
52:45as I did
52:46when I first left here
52:47about six weeks ago.
52:49I'd like to again
52:50thank everyone
52:51for all your thoughts
52:52and prayers.
52:53You've been great.
52:54And if you'd like
52:55to do something
52:56really great,
52:57be a donor.
52:58I told him
53:00that this was
53:02a problem
53:02that we didn't
53:03have a cure for.
53:04Well, we were
53:05floored.
53:10You know,
53:10they basically said,
53:11you know,
53:11there's no hope.
53:18I read a letter
53:19and I told him
53:20pretty much
53:21how I felt
53:22and what he meant
53:23to me
53:23all those years.
53:26He knew
53:27that I loved him.
53:29You know,
53:30I wanted everything
53:31to be okay with us
53:32before he died.
53:40We had time
53:41telling we loved him
53:42but a lot of people
53:43don't get that chance
53:44to tell someone
53:45they love
53:46that they love him.
53:47After the Mantle
53:48family's tearful goodbye,
53:50Mickey's sons
53:51reached out
53:52to their father's
53:52baseball family.
53:54The friends
53:55who Mickey loved,
53:56whose respect
53:57meant so much,
53:59his old Yankee teammates.
54:04On the eve
54:05of his death,
54:05August 13, 1995,
54:08they rushed to Dallas
54:09to say goodbye
54:10to their friend,
54:11Mickey Mantle,
54:12a great teammate
54:13who mattered to them
54:15as much as he did
54:16to an entire generation.
54:18when we hugged each other,
54:24we grabbed our hands
54:25and he says,
54:27I love you guys,
54:28I love you both
54:29and he said,
54:29we love you too.
54:30today is a sad day
54:43for the Yankee family
54:46and Yankee fans everywhere.
54:50today we have lost
54:53one of our own,
54:56one of the greatest
54:58ballplayers
54:59in the history
55:01of baseball.
55:05Please join now
55:07in a few moments
55:09of silent prayer
55:11as we all remember
55:14Mickey Mantle.
55:17Every boy
55:25builds a shrine
55:27to some baseball hero
55:28and before that shrine,
55:32a candle
55:32always burns.
55:35For a huge portion
55:36of my generation,
55:38Mickey Mantle
55:39was that baseball hero.
55:40I felt that my childhood
55:45had finally ended
55:46and I was in my 40s.
55:50It's been said
55:51that the truth
55:52is never pure
55:53and rarely simple.
55:57He was that humble kid
55:59that felt the struggles
56:01and then in the end
56:03took another one deep,
56:06died a hero.
56:10The emotional truths
56:15of childhood
56:16have a power
56:17that transcends
56:18objective fact.
56:21They stay with us
56:22through all the years.
56:27They say you never
56:28forget your first love.
56:31There's a part of him
56:32that you carry with you
56:33your whole life
56:34that doesn't ever go away.
56:39None of us
56:40Mickey included
56:41would want to be held
56:43to account
56:43for every moment
56:45of our lives.
56:47But how many of us
56:48could say
56:49that our best moments
56:51were as magnificent
56:53as his?
56:57His mystique
56:59and his aura
56:59of the legacy
57:00that'll never die
57:01and it'll go on
57:01forever and ever and ever.
57:02I just hope God
57:18has a place for him
57:19where he can run again
57:20and smile
57:23that boyish smile.
57:24God knows
57:28no one's perfect
57:28and God knows
57:30there's something special
57:32about heroes.
57:38Well, there you go.
57:39And we'll be right back to you.
57:40I'll see you next time.
57:41Bye-bye.
57:42Bye-bye.
57:43Bye-bye.
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