SPORTS CENTRAL -- The Giants also gave him a Willie McCovey Day near the end of the 1977 season. If you were in San Francisco at the time, you’d have thought they were either crowning a king, celebrating a Nobel Prize for Lawrence Ferlinghetti, or electing and inaugurating Tony Bennett as the mayor. Even San Francisco State University professor of literature Eric Solomon got into the act.
“We all want to come to the edge of the Pacific,” Solomon said before the Candlestick Park throng, “find success when young, and discover success again, gain another chance before it's too late. In an era of hard, financially aggressive, contract-minded athletes, Willie McCovey seems free, kind, warm, the way we like to think of San Francisco itself, a bit laid back, no New York or Chicago, cities always on the make. Let New York have the brawling power of Babe Ruth, let Boston have the arrogant force of Ted Williams. Let us have the warm strength of Willie McCovey.”