Willie Davis RIP

By Steven Booth

To me, Willie Davis will always be the Dodgers center fielder. I don’t include the guys who played before him, and fair or not I don’t include the guys after him.

It comes down to this- When I was seven or eight, lying in the bedroom I shared with my three brothers, listening to the games on a cheap clock radio, it was always Willie Davis who started in center field, and usually batted third. Without looking at his reputable statistics on the internet, I remember, through Vin Scully and Jerry Doggett’s voices, that he was a feared and dangerous hitter.

I knew from playing my statis-pro games a few years later, that he had a dangerous combination of power and speed. He could hit leadoff just as well as he could hit cleanup. The Dodgers in those days were usually in the playoff mix and sometimes in the world series, and Davis played an integral role throughout the 1960′s through the early 1970′s.

He also played an integral role as one of the main characters that mesmerized me as a boy and made me fall in love with this amazing game. It was listening to those games on that little radio that captivated me for life. Nothing against Jimmy Wynn or Matt Kemp, but to me, Davis will always be etched in my mind as  the centerfielder for the Dodgers.

His passing is another reminder that the game and the world is changing. Perhaps my sons will always look at Matt Kemp as The Center Fielder for the Dodgers,  and that would be a good thing. However,  me and other fortysomething fans will always have our memories of Willie Davis, batting third, playing center field for Your Los Angeles Dodgers.

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