The two top talents of the time, Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays, have hit the ball harder and more successfully so far this early season than at any period in careers which, to be frank about it, never have quite reached expectations.

Mays and Mantle, both 10-year men at 30, have so much ability that, baseball men agree, they've never hit the heights.

Each enjoys seeing the other hit home runs ( `` I hope Roger hits 80 '', Mantle says ), and each enjoys even more seeing himself hit home runs ( `` and I hope I hit 81 '' ).

On July 31, 1969, Aaron hit his 537th home run, passing Mickey Mantle ; this moved him into third place on the career home run list, after Willie Mays and Babe Ruth.

During the second game of the 2006 regular season, Griffey hit home run # 537, surpassing Mickey Mantle for 12th on the all-time list.

During the game, Mantle hit three home runs.

" Mantle immediately broke out of his slump, going on to hit. 311 with 23 homers and 87 RBIs during his stay in Kansas City.

Mantle hit. 255 that season with only 19 home runs.

Mantle also hit some of the longest home runs in Major League history.

Another Mantle homer, hit right-handed off Chuck Stobbs at Griffith Stadium in Washington, D. C. on April 17, 1953, was measured by Yankees traveling secretary Red Patterson ( hence the term " tape-measure home run ") to have traveled 565 feet ( 172 m ).

Mantle twice hit balls off the third-deck facade at Yankee Stadium, nearly becoming the only player ( along with Negro Leagues star Josh Gibson, though Gibson's home run has never been conclusively verified ) to hit a fair ball out of the stadium during a game.

On May 22, 1963, against Kansas City's Bill Fischer, Mantle hit a ball that fellow players and fans claimed was still rising when it hit the high facade, then caromed back onto the playing field.

Mays ' fly was hit to deep right center, and as both Mantle and DiMaggio converged to make the catch, DiMaggio called for it at the last second, causing Mantle to suddenly stop short as his cleats caught a drainage cover in the outfield grass.

Mantle hit the ball for his 535th career home run putting him in sole possession of third place on the all-time home run list, behind only Babe Ruth and Willie Mays.

After the game, McLain smilingly denied that he had served up an easy pitch for Mantle to hit, however, he was later reprimanded by Major League Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn.

The highest home run and RBI totals by a batting winner were achieved by Mickey Mantle and Lou Gehrig, respectively ; Mantle hit 52 home runs in 1956, and Gehrig batted in 165 runs in 1934, their only Triple Crown seasons.

* The first home run in the Astrodome was hit by Mickey Mantle off of pitcher Turk Farrell on April 9, 1965 in an exhibition game between the Astros and Yankees.

Widely regarded as one of the greatest second basemen of all time, during his career Gehringer, who batted left-handed and threw with his right, compiled a. 320 batting average and had seven seasons with more than 200 hits – a hit total never reached in a season by Ted Williams or Mickey Mantle and reached only once by Willie Mays.

Willie's big day revived the running argument about the relative merits of Mays and Mickey Mantle.

With Mickey Mantle and Yogi Berra both out of action due to injuries, the American League champs still mounted a 15-hit attack against a parade of eight Cincinnati pitchers, the most ever used by one team in a series game.

Mantle, the bull-necked blond switch-hitter, had one sensational triple-crown season, 1959, when he batted and also led the American League in home runs, 52, and rbi's, 130.

Now, apparently happier under new managers, Mays and Mantle, the perfect players, are behaving as though they're going to pass those previous peaks.

Mantle, it's apparent, resented Casey Stengel's attempts to push and prod him into the perfection the veteran manager saw as a thrilling possibility.

Stengel inherited DiMaggio, Rizzuto, but he brought up Mantle from Class C to the majors, from Joplin to New York.

Inheriting a more mature Mantle, who now has seen the sights on and off Broadway, Ralph Houk quietly bestowed, no pun intended, the mantle of authority on Mickey.

And what leadership a proud Mantle has given so far.

The opinion continues here that with a 162-game schedule, pitching spread thin through a 10-team league and a most inviting target in Los Angeles' Wrigley Field Jr., Mantle just might break the most glamorous record on the books, Babe Ruth's 60 homers of 1927.

When Mickey Charles Mantle, the New York Yankees' man of muscle, drives a home run 450 feet into the bleachers, his feat touches upon the sublime.

Their names are Mantle and Maris, their team is the Yankees, and their threat is real.

After 108 games in 1961, Mickey Mantle has 43, Roger Maris 41.

All Mantle needs is eight more home runs in August and ten in September, and he will establish a new record.

Neither Mantle nor Maris, understandably, will predict 60 home runs for himself.

But one thing is for certain: There is no dissension between Mantle, the American League's Most Valuable Player in 1956 and 1957, and Maris, the MVP in 1960.

Mantle, Maris, and Bob Cerv, a utility outfielder, share an apartment in Jamaica, Long Island, not far from New York International Airport.

They divide up the household chores: Cerv does most of the cooking ( breakfast and sandwich snacks, with dinner out ), Mantle supplies the transportation ( a white 1961 Oldsmobile convertible ), and Maris drives the 25-minute course from the apartment house to Yankee Stadium.

Mantle, Maris, and Cerv probably share one major-league record already: Among them, they have fifteen children -- eight for Cerv, four for Mantle, and three for Maris.

As roommates, teammates, and home-run mates, Mantle, 29, who broke in with the Yankees ten years ago, and Maris, 26, who came to the Yankees from Kansas City two years ago, have strikingly similar backgrounds.

Both are 6 feet tall and weigh between 195 and 200 pounds, but Mantle, incredibly muscular ( he has a 17-1/2-inch neck ), looks bigger.

Mantle, more concerned with dress, buys his suits four at a time at Neiman-Marcus in Dallas and pays as much as $250 each.

Mantle is not normally given to public speaking -- or, for that matter, to private speaking.

If working in a zinc mine, which he once did for 87-1/2 cents an hour, paid more than playing center field for the Yankees, Mantle would work in a zinc mine.

Mantle is considerably better hitting for average (

His first foray into television was a documentary for NBC's Omnibus, Dancing is a Man's Game ( 1958 ) where he assembled a group of America's greatest sportsmen – including Mickey Mantle, Sugar Ray Robinson and Bob Cousy – and re-interpreted their moves choreographically, as part of his lifelong quest to remove the effeminate stereotype of the art of dance, while articulating the philosophy behind his dance style.

On August 7,, after Williams was booed for dropping a fly ball from Mickey Mantle, Williams spat at one of the fans that was taunting him on the top of the dugout.

Archie Comics is an American comic book publisher headquartered in the Village of Mamaroneck, Town of Mamaroneck, New York, known for its many series featuring the fictional teenagers Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Reggie Mantle and Jughead Jones.

Mickey Charles Mantle ( October 20, 1931 – August 13, 1995 ) was an American baseball center fielder who played 18 seasons in Major League Baseball ( MLB ) for the New York Yankees from 1951 to 1968.

Mantle was noted for his hitting ability, both for average and for power.

As a teenager, Mantle rooted for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Mantle signed for $ 140 per month ($ today ) with a $ 1, 500 ($ today ) signing bonus.

Five years earlier, in 1956, Mantle had challenged Ruth's record for most of the season, and the New York press had been protective of Ruth on that occasion also.

" The press seemed to root for Mantle and to belittle Maris.