Jim Davenport

Jim DavenportMississippi Sports Hall of Fame and Museum - Hall of Fame Inductees

Jim Davenport Joins Sports Hall of Fame

Alabaster Newsletter, July 2006.
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Davenport was born in Siluria, Ala., in 1933 and graduated from Thompson High School, where he was a star quarterback on the football team.

"When I went to Thompson High School, it wasn't near the Thompson High School it is now.I think we had like 20-something kids in the graduating class.Of course, you know now what they've got in the senior graduating class.But I enjoyed it.It was small at that time, and we had a good athletic program for our size," Davenport said.

Davenport attended the University of Southern Mississippi on a football scholarship and quarterbacked the team to two victories over the University of Alabama.But it was in baseball that he would truly make his mark.

After his junior year of college, a Birmingham scout named Dickie Martin saw him playing baseball and offered him $4,000 to play professionally.Four years later, after three seasons in the minors, Davenport joined Major League Baseball with the San Francisco Giants.

"It was fairly exciting for me, an old country boy coming out of Alabama to go and be in San Francisco, but gosh, we came into a new city, which was great, out there, because they came out of New York in '57, and moved to San Francisco.So it was new for the ball club and new for me and new for everybody," he said.

Over the next 13 years, Davenport would excel at third base for the Giants, garnering a Gold Glove, an All-Star appearance, and even establishing the Major League record for consecutive errorless games at third base (97).He also led the National League in fielding percentage three years in a row.

Today, Davenport still works in the Giants organization, in player personnel, giving him 43 total years with the team, during which he's experienced a lot of great baseball.Among the high points, he counts his 1962 All-Star appearance.

"It was great," he said.
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Playing against [Mickey] Mantle, [Roger] Maris, Whitey Ford, Yogi Berra, and all those guys was just great for me," Davenport said.
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He could do everything and do it so, so good," Davenport said.