Wills was a baseball analyst for NBC-TV’s “Recreation of the Week” through the Nineteen Seventies.
Taking on a weak group when he was named the Mariners’ supervisor, he was in all probability most remembered in Seattle for being suspended for 2 video games after he was caught illegally ordering the group’s groundskeeper to increase the batter’s field by a foot towards the pitcher’s rubber earlier than a recreation with the Oakland A’s on April 25, 1981. Billy Martin, the A’s supervisor, believed Wills was attempting to present Mariner batters a greater probability to attach in opposition to his beginning pitcher, Rick Langford, earlier than his deliveries broke.
Wills was fired on Could 6. He had solely a 26-56 document because the Mariners’ supervisor.
He acknowledged in his memoir, “On the Run: The By no means Boring and Usually Surprising Lifetime of Maury Wills” (1992), written with Mike Celizic, that he struggled with cocaine habit, however he turned sober within the late Nineteen Eighties. He was later a baserunning teacher for the Dodger group and for different groups.
Wills had six youngsters, all from his first marriage, to Gertrude (Elliott) Wills, whom he married in highschool, in line with his memoir. That marriage resulted in divorce, as did his second marriage, to Angela George.
He’s survived by his third spouse, Carla; two sons, Barry and Bump; 4 daughters, Mauricia Wills, Anita Wills, Wendi Wills and Susan Wills-Quam; seven grandchildren; and eight great-grandchildren. Quite a lot of his siblings additionally survive him.
Wills’s son Bump was an infielder for the Texas Rangers and Chicago Cubs within the late Nineteen Seventies and early ’80s.
Although his Dodgers had been normally winners, Wills didn’t want to take a look at the scoreboard to inform when he had fallen brief. “I do know when I’ve had a awful day simply by trying down at my uniform,” he instructed Sports activities Illustrated in 1965. “If it isn’t soiled, I haven’t scored two runs, I haven’t carried out my job.”
Alex Traub contributed reporting.