Yes he passed away tonight. I was only a tiny little kid when he was such a star but my dad told me that he was the greatest offensive shortstop in baseball history. By the time I was going to games, he was playing first base and I remember one of Mauch's rules was that when bunting, you always bunted to Banks and not to Santo because Mauch felt that Santo had a better arm.
But not a better bat, and since I loved Santo and thought he was a great hitter, that should tell you all you need to know about Banks. By the way, to see how tough the NL was in the early 60's, the Cubs had 3, count em, 3 Hall of Famers batting 3-4-5 in the order [Williams, Santo, Banks] and still were one of the weakest teams in the league.
