The legend knows. Willie Mays has lived a Giants World Series upset, and the Hall of Famer told The Post yesterday not to sell these new-age Giants short.
Say Hey, these Giants could pull it off — just as Willie’s Giants did in 1954.
“We got a lot of young kids and that’s what this game is all about,” Mays said of the matchup between the Giants and the Rangers that begins tomorrow at AT&T Park in San Francisco. “If we can get kids like that to shine on the stage where they thought they were never going to get there, anything can happen.”
Mays, 79, believes in these players. He goes to most games and has watched them excel all season. The Giants were not supposed to win the NL West. They were not supposed to beat the Phillies. But now here they are, facing the heavy-hitting Rangers, who destroyed the Yankees in the ALCS.
The World Series could become a Freak Show. Mays is looking forward to watching Tim Lincecum pitch the opener. “He could pitch two or three times in this series,” said Mays, who knows pitching and defense is the name of the October game. “He’s really a good kid. I like him a lot. It’s a good team, a good bunch of guys all pulling for each other.”
Before throwing out the ceremonial first pitch in Game 5 of the NLCS, Mays spent a lot of time in the Giants’ clubhouse. He is planning to be at the games at AT&T Park, “even though I’ve got a little bit of a cold,” he said.
In 1954 Mays’ Giants swept the Indians, who had won 111 games that season. The Cleveland pitching staff featured three Hall of Famers. “We did pretty good,” Mays noted in his usual understated style.
Those Giants played in New York, at the Polo Grounds. They knew they could beat the mighty Indians that included Bob Lemon and Bob Feller. Mays revealed why the Giants were so confident.
“We played them just about every other day in spring training, and we played them good,” he explained. “So it was really no big deal for us. They had us as underdogs going into the World Series.”
In the eighth inning of Game 1 at the Polo Grounds with the score 2-2, the Indians put runners on first and second. Vic Wertz hit a towering shot to center off lefty reliever Don Liddle. Mays turned and raced to catch the ball over his shoulder on the warning track. He spun and fired the ball back to the infield, cap falling to the ground. Larry Doby, who had been on second, advanced only to third. The Giants won in the 10th.
When I asked about the throw, Mays said, “You can’t make the throw without the catch. My thinking was, I’ve got to get the ball back to the infield because I had scored many times from second base on fly balls that were hit a long ways in the Polo Grounds. I knew Larry could run pretty good. I knew if I caught the ball, I had to get rid of it right away.
“If you look at the films, nobody came out because I never had a cutoff man, I never used them. It was a huge play, we got out of the inning and Dusty Rhodes hit the home run to win the first game.”
New Yorkers love Willie Mays. “I played for the fans,” he said. “It wasn’t about money and things like that. It was all about, ‘Can I do a good job out there so that when they go home, they can say to their kids, ‘There’s a guy in center field that we’ve got to take you to the game to see.’
“When I first came up they greeted me very, very warmly and if you remember, I went 0-for-12. I got one hit off of [Warren] Spahn and went 0-for-12 again. The fans believed in me.”
Just like the Say Hey Kid believes in these new-age Giants.
kevin.kernan@nypost.com