The Treniers: Say Hey (The Willie Mays Song)

It’s the first day of summer, so a song about baseball seems appropriate. I was a child of the ’70s who loved to play baseball. My team was the Orioles and my favorite player was Brooks Robinson. I have since lost track of baseball, especially the players. This is mostly due to several reasons, but one of them is the changes in the game that have occurred due to free agency, salary caps, and out of control contracts. I understand how this is all good for the players, but there was something special about the days when a player stayed with one team for an entire career, for good or bad. Brooks Robinson played for the Orioles from 1955 to 1977, and that longevity with one team allowed him to become a generational hero within families and a Baltimore icon. One of the greatest players who exemplified this type of one-team longevity was Willie Mays. Mays started in the Negro League and spent his last 2 years with the New York Mets, but he was the cornerstone of the New York/San Francisco Giants from May 1951 to May 1971. He was an icon and hero for millions of fans and players. He died two days ago at the age of 93. There are only a handful of baseball players who almost every American knows, whether they were born in the ’40s or the ’90s. Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, and Willie Mays top that list. The song “Say Hey” was recorded by rock and roll pioneers The Treniers in 1955 when Mays was just starting his historic career. Mays appears at the start of the record, which is one of the best songs about baseball ever written. Say hey.

To learn more about The Treniers, check out their Wikipedia article.

To listen to all of the songs of the day, check out the Radio Faux Show Song of the Day playlist.

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