Throughout its "50 Greatest Athletes" series, ESPN has done a fine job of weaving into its profiles the human, sometimes unfortunate, personal stories of these extraordinary performers.
In the case of tonight's (7 p.m.) feature on Willie Mays, it seems the network has gone too far -- focusing too much on Mays' problems (real and perceived) and not enough on what earned him the No. 8 spot on ESPN's list of the top North American athletes of the century.
Among the subjects covered are Mays' first marriage that ended in divorce, his "loner" status with his Giants teammates and San Francisco's supposed indifference to Mays when measured against the city's affection for Joe DiMaggio, Willie McCovey and Orlando Cepeda.
Executive producer Mark Shapiro is readily aware of the often-painful tone of the program. "I'll never watch it again," Shapiro said. "It's such a sad story."
It didn't have to be told that sadly. Take, for example, the notion that San Francisco did not embrace Mays, specifically because he was "New York's hero." That might have been true in the first few years after the Giants moved from the East Coast to the West Coast for the 1958 season. More pointedly, the show accurately details the racial prejudice Mays endured when he tried to buy a home in the Bay Area.
But, by the mid-'60s, Candlestick crowds invariably saved their longest, loudest ovations for Mays, the player -- and, in the past 2 1/2 decades, for Mays, the legend, whenever he appeared at the park.
The final video of Mays in the program shows him throwing out the ceremonial last pitch at Candlestick after the Giants' final game there on September 30. To tease that moment, host Dan Patrick earlier says Mays "finally gains acceptance in the city that rejected him."
Mays' godson, Barry Bonds, says about that scene at the 'Stick, "I was thinking . . . he's got to understand how much these people really, really love him." It's hard to believe they started really, really loving Mays just on that day.
Moreover, as Mays' former Giants teammate and manager Bill Rigney says, "No matter what was going on in his private life, once he put the uniform on that said 'Giants,' he was in another world. It was his world now."
Mays does not address on camera any of the "private life" issues the show details. Shapiro said Mays acknowledged many of those issues but did not want to talk publicly about them.
Shapiro said Mays was "pleasant doing the interview and was excited about it." Shapiro said Mays did have some problems with the way the interview originally was lit. As a result, when Mays does come on camera, a shadow appears to dominate the right side of his face.
Mays, 68, was unavailable to be interviewed for this column because a bad back has forced him into the hospital.
Of course, ESPN does deal with some of Mays' greatness on the field. The program deftly depicts his famous catch of Vic Wertz's drive in Game 1 of the 1954 World Series. The show also has a poignant segment regarding Mays' relationship with his first Giants manager, Leo Durocher.
Shapiro, who recently became general manager of "ESPN Classic," and his staff employ some of the signature touches of the "Greatest Athletes" series to tell Mays' story. The show effectively uses photographs and newspaper headlines to cover voice-overs that usually would have accompanied videotape or film.
"You've already seen so much of that footage," Shapiro said, "but with the photos, the imagination runs wild."
Other distinctive touches include the use of empty ballparks to lend a dramatic feel to certain parts of the script and the use of a full-screen graphic at the beginning of the program to highlight a definitive quote about each athlete.
For Mays, the quote is, "There have been two geniuses in the world -- Shakespeare and Willie Mays."
In tonight's program, ESPN should have emphasized more of the genius.