Hall-iday

Bill Mazeroski said he was “embarrassed,” but he should look at the bright side. At least now he will be remembered for something besides his famous Game 7 walk-off home run that vaulted the Pittsburgh Pirates to a 1960 World Series victory over the New York Yankees.

Mazeroski, inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame on Sunday along with Kirby Puckett and Dave Winfield, provided one of the most emotional moments in recent induction ceremony history when he was so overwhelmed he could not deliver his speech.

“I’ve got 12 pages here, and that’s not like me--I’ll probably skip half of it,” said Mazeroski, a a lifetime .260 hitter who was known more for his glove than his bat.

“I think defense belongs in the Hall of Fame. It deserves as much credit as pitching and hitting. I’m proud to be going into the Hall of Fame because of my defensive abilities . . .”

Mazeroski, 64, paused to rub a tear from his eye. He composed himself, but not for long.

“When the Pirates retired my number, I thought that would be the greatest thing to ever happen to me,” Mazeroski said. “It’s going to be hard to top this.”

Mazeroski broke down again, started crying, and thanked “all the people who made the long trip here to listen to this crap.”

As a sun-drenched crowd of about 23,000, which included 40 hall of famers, Commissioner Bud Selig and New York Gov. George E. Pataki, rose to give the former second baseman a standing ovation, Mazeroski returned to his seat on the stage.

“That may be one of the shortest induction speeches ever,” said Cincinnati Reds’ broadcaster George Grande, who has served as master of ceremonies for this event for 22 years, “but it was one of the finer moments.”

Some on stage fought back tears as well.

“You could feel how Maz was feeling,” Puckett said. “I was crying for Maz. I told him when he gets back to the hotel his wife is going to kill him, and he started laughing. It was very emotional.”

Emotions ran as high as the 88-degree temperatures for good friends Puckett and Winfield, who played together for the Minnesota Twins in 1993-94; for the family of Hilton Smith, the late Kansas City Monarch star pitcher who was the Negro Leagues inductee, and for Times baseball columnist Ross Newhan and Florida Marlin Spanish radio voice Rafael “Felo” Ramirez.

Newhan, who has covered baseball for more than 40 years, received the Hall of Fame’s annual J.G. Taylor Spink Award, given for meritorious contributions to baseball writing, and the Cuban-born Ramirez received the Ford C. Frick Award for major contributions to baseball broadcasting.

During his nine-minute induction speech, Puckett said his only regret was that his parents, who are deceased, and two brothers--Donnie, 50, and Spencer, 46--who died in the last two years were not able to share his moment.

“My mom is probably looking down right now thinking about all the spankings she gave me for hitting balls through neighbors’ windows and breaking lamps and everything in the house [playing baseball],” Puckett said.

“Mom, I hope you can see now that it was worth it. Your little baby is going to the Hall of Fame.”

Puckett, whose smile, intensity and exuberance rubbed off on teammates and fans, hit .318 with 2,304 hits, 207 home runs and 1,085 runs batted in during a 12-year Twins’ career that was cut short in 1996 by the sudden loss of vision in his right eye. Sympathy was not on his wish list Sunday.

“When I got glaucoma, I didn’t feel sorry for myself,” said Puckett, who led the Twins to World Series titles in 1987 and ‘91, won six Gold Gloves and played in 10 consecutive All-Star games (1986-95). “It may be cloudy in my right eye, but the sun is shining very brightly in my left eye.”

Puckett urged kids to believe in themselves, “and if someone says you can’t be what you want to be, keep working hard, because anything is possible,” he said.

Just look at Puckett.

He grew up in the Robert Taylor Homes, a housing project on Chicago’s South Side where he “walked right past gangbangers and drug dealers with a bat in one hand and my books in the other,” Puckett said at a post-ceremony news conference.

“They said, ‘Why don’t you come with us and drink some wine?’ My calling was to play baseball. . . . I didn’t want to be a product of my environment. Ever since I was 5 years old and saw Billy Williams and Ernie Banks play on TV, I wanted to play baseball. From where I came from . . . I wish I could take you there, because you’d be amazed I was able to make it here.”

Winfield, like Puckett a first-ballot inductee, played the bulk of his 22-year career with the Padres (1973-80) and Yankees (1981-90), and the strong-armed, line-drive-hitting outfielder was a lock to reach the Hall of Fame after batting .283 with 3,110 hits, 465 home runs and 1,833 RBIs.

“A lot of people said, ‘Dave, you know you’re going to be here someday,’ and I’d say, ‘No way,’ ” Winfield said during a 22-minute induction speech. “I didn’t know what it took to get here. All I can say is, had I known I would be here today, I would have saved all my rookie cards.”

Winfield, who hit .262 with 28 homers and 86 RBIs for the Angels in 1991, thanked everyone from Jackie Robinson and Roberto Clemente to his American Legion coach in St. Paul, Minn., but he made a special point of acknowledging Yankee owner George Steinbrenner.

The two feuded publicly during Winfield’s playing days in New York. Steinbrenner once called Winfield “Mr. May” because of his postseason struggles and once hired an FBI agent to find wrongdoing in Winfield’s charitable foundation.

After thanking many of his coaches, former managers including Doug Rader of the Angels and front-office executives such as Buzzie Bavasi and Mike Port, Winfield thanked Steinbrenner for bringing him to New York.

“I’m serious,” Winfield said. “I’m glad that time, distance, respect and clearer minds have brought about a friendship that we didn’t have early on, but we have today.”

Newhan, The Times’ national baseball writer since 1985, said it was “a strange feeling to find myself on this side of the podium, considering all the times I’ve come to Cooperstown to cover all those ceremonies. . . .

“To receive an award that writers of the stature of Jim Murray and Red Smith have received is far beyond my imagination, and I can only say I’ve truly been blessed.”

Had it not been for a Long Beach Wilson High journalism instructor named John Gartner, Newhan said, he probably wouldn’t have been in Cooperstown on Sunday.

“I had no direction at that point,” said Newhan, whose son, David, is a Philadelphia Phillie utility infielder.

“If [Gartner] hadn’t hollered my name and pounded his desk one day, I might still be sitting there asleep with no real clue what I wanted to do with my life.”