I’m a lifelong baseball fan whose heroes were Mickey Mantle of the Yankees and Tom Seaver of the Mets. I never met Ted Williams, but I did have a book I wrote, Stadium For Rent, enshrined in the Ted Williams Hitters Hall of Fame at Tropicana Field here in St. Petersburg. Just sayin’! If you love baseball as much as I do, there will be moments in Nick Davis’s new documentary, Ted Williams: “The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived,” that will choke you up and maybe even bring a tear to at least one eye. It is extremely well done, compacting the life of one of sports’ most accomplished, combative, and competitive characters into a mesmerizing hour. NICK DAVIS podcast excerpt: "Ted Williams was a man whose ambition was to be known as 'The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived.' Whether or not he succeeded at that is open to discussion and debate. But that was the focus of his life. He was so obsessed, so compulsive about hitting, studying batting, weighing his bat! Nobody else was heating their bats to remove any excess moisture that accumulated on the bat. But Ted was doing all of that." Boston Red Sox fans won’t be able to resist the continuity of Wade Boggs talking about Ted Williams, or that one of the film’s executive producers is “Big Papi” himself, David Ortiz. And yes, Davis even manages to squeeze in a discussion of why the Williams family cryogenically saved Ted’s head. You know, “The Frozen Splinter.” Ted Williams: “The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived” – narrated by “Mad Men” star Jon Hamm -- premieres on Monday, July 23, at 9 p.m. on your local PBS television station. After that, you can see it online at pbs.org/americanmasters and on PBS apps. (NOTE - During the interview, I mistakenly stated that I thought the great San Francisco Giants ballplayer Willie McCovey had recently passed. That is a mistake and I apologize for making it — Bob Andelman) Nick Davis • • • • • • • Ted Williams  • • • • •