Johnny Bench Shares Memories Of Willie Mays With Dan Dakich

The baseball world is reeling from news Tuesday that MLB legend and Hall of Famer Willie Mays had passed away at the age of 93.

READ: Loss Of A Legend: Baseball Great Willie Mays Dies At 93-Years-Old

Another baseball legend, Hall of Fame catcher Johnny Bench, joined OutKick's Don't @ Me with Dan Dakich to reminisce about his experiences playing against Mays and his personal interactions with him. In one particularly great story, Bench described how Mays would surreptitiously try to steal signs while up at the plate. 

"Willie was just absolutely the best," Bench said. "I mean, he came up to home plate batting, and he had that swagger, he'd swing that bat back and forth, his head would go back." Bench continued, saying that he "wanted to steal signs" by trying to look back at the catcher's signs while in the batters box. One time, Bench said, Mays looked back six or seven times before snapping, "Finally he stepped out of the box and said, 'You gonna call a pitch or what?'"

"I said, ‘yeah as soon as you quit looking back here;' he was trying to look back and steal my signs. And he said, 'Oh man, you got me, you got me.'"

Dakich also asked Bench what Willie Mays meant to him as a player and as a person, to which Bench explained how Mays endeared himself to a young rookie by asking "How you doing, kid?" Bench also said Mays gave him one of his best moments as a player.

Bench made the National League All-Star team as the "third catcher" when he was 20-years-old in 1968, making him teammates with Mays. He described sitting in the clubhouse, not wanting to get in anyone's way, and saw that Willie was sitting directly across from him. Willie came up to him and said, "you should have been the starting catcher, and went back to his locker." According to Bench, that was as good as it gets: "I didn't need to play, I didn't need to do anything, Willie Mays justified everything that I could possibly hope for."

Jul 14, 2015; Cincinnati, OH, USA; (From left to right) Johnny Bench, Hank Aaron, Sandy Koufax, and Willie Mays are honored prior to the 2015 MLB All Star Game at Great American Ball Park. Mandatory Credit: David Kohl-USA TODAY Sports

Willie Mays Influenced Baseball For Generations

Even in 1968, 17 years after he'd made his major league debut, Mays was viewed as a legend by younger players. And in fact, despite playing in his age-37 season, Mays contributed 6.7 wins above replacement in 1968, hitting .289/.372/.488 in one of the toughest offensive seasons in the sport's history.

Bench also relayed a more recent story, explaining that longtime Milwaukee Brewers announcer Bob Uecker recently called Mays to joke with him, even with both men being over 90-years-old.

"Uecker called Willie, and Willie said, ‘Man, what are you doing now?’ Well he said, ‘Well I’m still playing, I'm still in the National Guard here, I'm still playing, usually I just play one game a month just to keep my pension up.'"

Bench said that those kind of jokes between the two were common, especially because of Bob Uecker's incredible sense of humor.

Check out the full interview below, and the Don't @ Me With Dan Dakich show on OutKick.