Joe DiMaggio: Baseball’s first media icon

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The Bio

“Baseball isn’t statistics, it’s Joe DiMaggio rounding second.” This is a fitting tribute to Joe DiMaggio, who was fondly named the Yankee Clipper and remained the mainstay of the Yankees dynasty that was victorious in nine World Series during his 13-year career from 1936 to 1951.

Joe DiMaggio was one of the most famous and well-known people in the United States in the middle of the 20th century. He was a famous hero in songs and books, and he was briefly married to Marilyn Monroe and Dorothy Arnold, two of the most beautiful women in the country at that time. Paul Simon wrote the hit song Mrs. Robinson about him, and for a generation, he was the face of Mister Coffee. But Joe DiMaggio was a baseball player first and foremost. Many people think he was one of the best players of all time. He was named the AL MVP three times, and his 56-game hitting streak in 1941 is considered by many to be the most impressive baseball record of all time. As the son of immigrants, he was the perfect example of the American Dream. His life was a story of “rags to riches” told in pinstripes. During his time with the Yankees, the team won 10 AL pennants and nine World Series championships. Only fellow Yankee Yogi Berra, who had ten World Series rings, has won more.

The center fielder was named “Joltin’ Joe,” “The Yankee Clipper,” and “Joe D.” He was born in California to parents who came from Sicily. Joe DiMaggio was their eighth child and one of their five sons. Vince and Dominic, two of his brothers, would also play in the major leagues. Joe DiMaggio started playing baseball when he was ten years old. He played third base at the North Beach playground near their home near Fisherman’s Wharf.

Joe DiMaggio did not want to go fishing with his father like two of his older brothers did. Instead, he played for a number of amateur and semi-pro teams in San Francisco, which has a lot of baseball teams. Joe got into professional baseball because of Vince, who was 19 at the time and played for the San Francisco Seals of the Pacific Coast League. Near the end of the 1932 season, when the Seals needed a shortstop, Vince talked Seals manager Ike Caveney into giving his 17-year-old brother a chance. Joe DiMaggio played in the last three games of the season and was then given a $225-a-month contract in 1933.

Because of his shaky arm, Joe DiMaggio was moved to the outfield. He hit .340 and set a PCL record by getting a hit in 61 straight games. In 1934, he hit .341, but a knee injury that kept him out of action in August scared teams in the major leagues away. The Yankees offered to buy his contract for $25,000 and five players, but only if he stayed with the Seals in 1935 to prove he was healthy. After Joe DiMaggio passed a physical in November, the Yankees paid $50,000 to buy his contract. During the 1935 season, he stayed with the Seals and hit.398 with 154 RBIs and 34 home runs. In 1935, Joe DiMaggio’s team won the PCL championship, and he was named the league’s Most Valuable Player.

Joe DiMaggio began his Yankees career

On May 3, 1936, Joe DiMaggio played his first game in the major leagues for the Yankees. He hit before Lou Gehrig in the lineup. Since 1932, the Yankees hadn’t been to the World Series, but they went on to win the next four.

In 1936, just two years after Babe Ruth had left the team, a highly-touted rookie came to spring training with high hopes. It didn’t take the new guy long to make a name for himself. Halfway through the season, when Joe DiMaggio was hitting around .350 and had started in right field for the All-Star Game, his picture was on the cover of Time magazine. In 1936, when he was a rookie, Joe DiMaggio hit 29 home runs, which was a record for that team. In 138 games, DiMaggio was able to do it. His record stood for more than 80 years, until Aaron Judge broke it with 52 home runs in 2017. On March 26, Dan Daniel wrote in The Sporting News, “Yankee fans see him as the Moses who will lead their team out of the second-place wilderness.”

In 1937, Joe DiMaggio improved on his performance as a rookie. He led the major leagues with 46 home runs, 151 runs scored, and 418 bases. From June 27 to August 12, he also got a hit in 43 of 44 games. In a close race with Detroit Tigers player Charlie Gehringer for American League MVP, he came in second.

Joe DiMaggio became the Yankee Clipper

Arch McDonald, who called games for the Yankees, called Joe DiMaggio the “Yankee Clipper” in 1939 because of his speed and range in the outfield, which he compared to the then-new Pan American airliner. In August of that year, Joe DiMaggio got 53 RBIs, which tied Hack Wilson’s record from 1930 for the most in a single month. He also won his first batting title and Most Valuable Player award and led the Yankees to their fourth straight World Series title.

Joe DiMaggio was the classic player with five skills. He could hit for average and power, run, throw, and play the field. From 1931 to 1946, Joe McCarthy was the manager of the Yankees. He said that he was the best base runner he had ever seen. His all-around play helped the Yankees win the World Series in 1936, the first of four in a row. The 21-year-old star had proven that he was the best player since Babe Ruth. After the Series, his home town gave him a hero’s welcome.

By that time, everyone knew that the 6-foot-2, 190-pound outfielder was the best player in baseball, but some people still used his race to show how they thought he was. In 1940, Joe DiMaggio won his second batting title in a row.

Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak

In 1941, he became even more well-known. By getting a hit in 56 straight games, he set a record that will last for a long time. On May 15, when the streak started, the Yankees were in fourth place and DiMaggio had only hit .194 in the 20 games before that. Roger Peckinpaugh set the record of 29 games in 1919, and Earle Combs tied it in 1931. On June 17, Joe DiMaggio broke that record.

As Joe DiMaggio’s streak kept going, it became more and more of a national obsession. On June 29, DiMaggio surpassed the 19-year-old, 41-game hitting streak record of George Sisler in Washington. In 1941, Joe DiMaggio hit .357 and led the league in both runs batted in and total bases. He got 15 first-place votes and won his second MVP Award. Ted Williams, who hit.406 and led the league in home runs, slugging percentage, on-base percentage, and runs, only got eight first-place votes.

In 1942, Joe DiMaggio hit just .305, which was the lowest average of his seven years in the major leagues. He also hit the fewest home runs and drove in the fewest runs. The Yankees won the pennant, but they lost the World Series to the Cardinals. This was the only time in Joe DiMaggio’s career that the Yankees lost in the World Series.

Joe DiMaggio signed up for the Army Air Force on February 17, 1943. He never went into battle, like many other big leaguers. Instead, he played on service baseball teams to boost morale.

He was sent to Hawaii in June 1944, where Joe DiMaggio kept playing baseball and also spent a few weeks in a Honolulu hospital because of stomach ulcers. In September 1945, he was given a medical discharge after being sent back to the main island. In the meantime, his wife got a divorce and got to keep their son, Joe Jr.

After the war years

The New York Daily News called Joe DiMaggio “America’s No. 1 sports hero,” but his first season back after the war was a disappointment. He was 31 years old at the time. Even though his slugging percentage was the fourth best in the AL, his batting average (.290), RBIs (95), and home runs (25) were all lower than in any other season. As the 1947 season got close, it didn’t look like things would get better. The first thing people heard about Joe DiMaggio that year was that he was going to have surgery to get rid of a bone spur on his left heel. On January 7, a 3″ spur was taken off. Then, two months after the first surgery, the wound had to be closed with a skin graft.

Because of the injury, Joe DiMaggio didn’t play until April 19, when he came in as a pinch-hitter. The next day, he made his first start. In a 6–2 win over the Athletics, Joe DiMaggio hit a three-run homer.

Ted Williams, who won his second Triple Crown, was better than Joe DiMaggio in almost every offensive category, but Joe DiMaggio became MVP for the third time for his all-around play that helped the Yankees win their first pennant since 1943. The Yankee Clipper beat his long-time rival by one point, 202-201, because he got eight first-place votes and the Red Sox slugger only got three.

Joe DiMaggio hit just .231 in the famous World Series against the Dodgers, but he did hit two home runs, one of which gave the Yankees a 2–1 win in Game Five. But what people remember most about him from this World Series is how he reacted to Al Gionfriddo’s amazing catch in Game Six. In the sixth inning, when the Yankees were behind 8–5, they put two runners on base with two outs, bringing Joe DiMaggio to the plate as the tying run. Gionfriddo, an outfielder who didn’t play much, came in as a defensive replacement in that inning. The Yankee hitter hit a long drive toward the visitors’ bullpen in deep left, but Gionfriddo was able to track it down and make a diving catch just short of the bullpen before crashing into the waist-high gate near the 415-foot sign. Joe DiMaggio’s reaction was just as interesting as the catch. When the fielder got the ball, the normally calm star kicked at the dirt near second base. This was a rare sign of emotion for the normally calm player.

Even though he had a bone spur in his right heel, Joe DiMaggio played in 153 games in 1948. He led the league in home runs, RBIs, and total bases, and he was second to Lou Boudreau in the MVP vote. On February 7, 1949, Joe DiMaggio became the first baseball player to make more than $100,000. He did this by signing a contract worth $100,000 ($1,140,000 in today’s dollars), which included bonuses of $70,000.

The later years of Joe DiMaggio

The 1949 season was one of his worst, but he came back from an injury in a heroic way in the middle of the season, which helped him become known as an inspiring team leader. Media continued reporting that DiMaggio’s career was nearing its end. This shocked Joe DiMaggio and he stayed in his hotel room by himself. The pain went away all of a sudden in the middle of June. Two weeks later, he played his first game in a very important series at Fenway Park against the Red Sox. In the first game on June 28, he drove in two runs and scored two himself, helping his team win 5–4. The next day, he hit two home runs and drove in four runs. He then finished his first regular-season series since September by hitting his fourth home run in three games and driving in three runs. The Yankees are now eight games ahead of the Red Sox because of the sweep.

Boston came back with a strong finish to the season that put them ahead of New York by one game with two games left at Yankee Stadium. In September, Joe DiMaggio was hospitalized with pneumonia, but he was in the starting lineup when the final series started.

On October 1, the day of the first game, it was also “Joe DiMaggio Day.” With his mother and brother Dom by his side, the Yankee Clipper was praised in a number of speeches and given what the New York Times called “a small mountain of gifts.” After his recent attack, Joe DiMaggio was said to look “wan and weak,” but he told his manager, Casey Stengel, that he hoped to play three innings. He played the whole game instead. In the fourth inning, when the Yankees were down 4–0, he hit a double and drove in their first run. The Yankees won 5–4, which tied the score with one game left.

In the final game, Vic Raschi kept the Red Sox from scoring for the first eight innings. However, in the ninth, two runs were scored when Joe DiMaggio’s tired legs couldn’t keep up with Bobby Doerr’s triple. DiMaggio ran in from center field to take himself out of the game. He was tired and knew that he was hurting his team. The Yankees kept playing well enough to win the game 5–3 and the pennant. Joe DiMaggio could only play in 76 games, but he hit.346 with 67 RBIs. The Associated Press gave him an award for having the best comeback in sports in 1949. The Yankees, who had been hurt for most of the season, got second place.

In 1950, Joe DiMaggio was able to play in 139 games. He hit .301 with 32 home runs, 122 RBIs, and a .585 slugging percentage, which was the best in the league. But old age and injuries kept him from playing more than 116 games in 1951. He hit only 12 home runs and had the lowest batting average of his career at .263. The 36-year-old veteran announced his retirement on December 11, 1951. He said, “If I can’t do it right, I don’t want to play any longer.”

When he stopped playing after the 1951 season, he was fifth all-time in home runs with 361 and sixth all-time in slugging percentage with .405 (.579). He was put into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1955, and a poll taken in 1969, the sport’s centennial year, named him the best player still alive.

Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio had one of the most well-known relationships. They met in 1952 through a mutual friend. In January of 1954, the couple exchanged their vows in front of a crowd of adoring fans and photographers at San Francisco City Hall. Marilyn Monroe filed for divorce from Joe DiMaggio in October 1954.

On October 12, 1998, he went to Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood, Florida, for surgery on his lung cancer. He stayed there for 99 days. On January 19, 1999, he went back to his home in Hollywood, Florida. He died there on March 8, 1999, at the age of 84.

The House tribute

On March 16, 1999, the House of Representatives passed a resolution honoring him “for his storied baseball career; for his many contributions to the nation throughout his lifetime; and for transcending baseball and becoming a symbol for the ages of talent, commitment and achievement.”

His successor in center field at Yankee Stadium, Mickey Mantle described how he viewed the Yankee Clipper: “Heroes are people who are all good with no bad in them. That’s the way I always saw Joe DiMaggio. He was beyond question one of the greatest players of the century.”

In May 2006, the adopted daughters of Joe DiMaggio’s son sold personal items that belonged to the player and it attracted $4.1 million. The items that got the most money were:

• $63,250 for the ball that broke Willie Keeler’s hitting-streak
• $29,900 for the 2,000th hit ball
• $281,750 for the 1947 MVP award
• $195,500 for the shirt of the 1951 World Series
• $69,000 for the HoF ring
• $80,500 for a photo with Marilyn Monroe writing “I love you Joe”
• $18,000 for Mercedes 420 gifted by the Yankees in 1991.

Joe DiMaggio’s Greatest Moments

• 1935 MVP Pacific Coast League San Francisco Seals
• 13-time AL All-Star (1936-1942 & 1946-1951)
• 3-time AL MVP (1939, 1941 & 1947)
• 2-time AL Batting Average Leader (1939 & 1940)
• 2-time AL Slugging Percentage Leader (1937 & 1950)
• AL Runs Scored Leader (1937)
• 3-time AL Total Bases Leader (1937, 1941 & 1948)
• AL Triples Leader (1936)
• 2-time AL Home Runs Leader (1937 & 1948)
• 2-time AL RBI Leader (1941 & 1948)
• 20-Home Run Seasons: 11 (1936-1942, 1946-1948 & 1950)
• 30-Home Run Seasons: 7 (1937-1941, 1948 & 1950)
• 40-Home Run Seasons: 1 (1937)
• 100 RBI Seasons: 9 (1936-1942, 1948 & 1950)
• 100 Runs Scored Seasons: 8 (1936-1939, 1941, 1942, 1948 & 1950)
• 200 Hits Seasons: 2 (1936 & 1937)
• Won nine World Series with the New York Yankees (1936, 1937, 1938, 1939, 1941, 1947, 1949, 1950 & 1951)
• Baseball Hall of Fame: Class of 1955

FAQs about Joe DiMaggio

The Stats

Joe DiMaggio’s Standard Batting Record

Joe DiMaggio’s Postseason Batting Record

Joe DiMaggio’s Career Graph

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