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'MANTLE' premieres 9-10 p.m. on July 13 |
 MICKEY MANTLE IN A HAPPY MOOD |
New HBO film captures
the real Mickey Mantle
of TheColumnists.com
Take five handkerchiefs, maybe a big towel and lots
of memories when you climb down on your couch to watch HBO’s
"Mantle" July 13 in an emotional documentary about
the great Yankee star.
This is so brutally honest, so emotional, so revealing, so filled
with sadness that I defy any viewer eight to 80 to walk away
from the set without tears running down your cheeks.
Mantle’s life, which ended in 1995, was funny and tragic,
heroic and disappointing, courageous and wasteful, bigger than
true life and smaller than a pin prick. It all depended when
you caught him, what mood he was in and what stage of his life
he was experiencing.
HBO captured everything there was to know about Mantle in this
film but chose to pull the heart strings, emphasize the sadness
and leave the viewer with sweaty palms and a dry mouth.
I knew Mantle almost 40 years as a sportswriter and observer
of his playing life, his off-field life and his restaurant business
life at his New York City hangout restaurant, Mickey Mantle’s
on Central Park South in Manhattan.
I would often sit there for hours as he told hilarious stories
about Billy Martin, Whitey Ford, Casey Stengel or any other name
that he would decide to describe or deride. Then, for no explainable
reason other than an extra drink, a wrong word, a mistaken joke,
Mantle would grow dark and bitter. That was time to exit.
He was as complex a personality as I ever covered in my own half
century around athletes. I wrote a book about Roger Maris and
spent a day with Mickey in his NYC hotel room reliving the greatest
baseball season ever, the 1961 Babe Ruth home run challenge.
That season ended for Mickey in a hospital bed with a deep infection
on his backside while Maris hit the famed 61 in ’61 off
Tracy Stallard.
Mantle was in tears that day when he explained how much he regretted
not making it through that most pressure-packed baseball season
ever.
He once broke an ankle climbing a wall in Baltimore. He was out
for three months and when the injury seemed never to heal I kidded
him with a column beginning, “There is no Mickey Mantle.
He is only a figment of the imagination of the New York Yankees
and Yankee fans.” The next day, as he again took batting
practice, he recognized my arrival near the batting cage by saying,
“You piss me off just standing there.” One of the best
of the Mantle bon mots. Even though I was the victim.
This film includes touching interviews with so many of the significant
people in Mantle’s life, including his embittered wife,
Merlyn, left behind to raise four sons as he journeyed laughingly
through life; one of his sons, Danny, who drank excessively to
develop a friendship with his dad; teammates Whitey Ford, Yogi
Berra, Moose Skowron, Tom Tresh and Bobby Murcer, the kid who
was to replace him as he replaced Joe DiMaggio in Yankee legend
status. DiMaggio never bought Mantle a cup of coffee and never
said hello to him for half the first season. Mantle adopted Murcer,
wined him, dined him and helped him. Different strokes for different
folks.
It is hard now in 2005 to measure the Mantle impact of half a
century ago. That era is gone and those emotions fail to surface
for ball players making 10, 15, 20 million dollars a year.
Broadcaster Bob Costas, who delivered Mantle’s eulogy at
his 1995 funeral, explains the cultural phenomenon easily.
Costas simply reaches into his wallet and pulls out the sealed
1958 Mickey Mantle bubble gum baseball card he has carried for
nearly half a century.
Everything about Mantle seemed to resonate with the public, including
that melodious name, Mickey Mantle. Roll that over your tongue
a few times and then try to equal it with Brett Favre. Maybe
Tom Brady can come close.
Neurotic comedian Richard Lewis captures the Mantle alliteration
best when he says in the film, “I’m just glad his name
wasn’t Sy Schwartzstein.”
Actor Ed Harris explains how he connected to Mantle in boyhood
games and Phil Linz, a Yankee infielder in the 1960s, recalls
Mantle’s humor when Linz was playing a harmonica on a team
bus after two bitter losses in Chicago. Manager Berra screamed
at Linz about playing. Linz asked Mantle what the skipper said.
Mantle replied, “He said to play louder.”
After leaving his Hall of Fame career behind in 1969, Mantle
bounced around the fringes of recognition for the next 15 years.
Then came the explosion of the card shows and autograph sessions
for $25,000 a pop, not bad for a guy who never broke the $100,000
salary barrier.
He opened the restaurant in 1987 with impresario Bill Liederman,
lived out the joyous last years there on his NY visits and became
ill in 1995. He earned a liver transplant because of who he was
though medical people deny his special place on the list and
cancer took him quickly after that.
At the end he held a press conference and told kids not to emulate
him. He wanted them to live the wholesome life he had missed.
I laughed a lot with Mickey through the years. I was blown off
a lot by him when he hated something I wrote or didn’t like
an inquisitive question while his knees ached and his thighs
throbbed.
Mickey Mantle. I still love the sound of his name. This HBO film
captures him remarkably well. Just be strong for the last 10
or 15 minutes. Don’t forget the handkerchiefs.
©2005 by Maury Allen.
The Maury Allen caricature is ©2001 by Jim Hummel. This
column first posted on July 4, 2005.
You
can comment on this column online. Please address your message
to either "The Editors" or Maury Allen. To send an
email, click here: talkback@thecolumnists.com
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