On May 21, 1948, Hall of
Fame New York Yankees great, Joe
DiMaggio hits for the cycle (single, double, triple, home run).
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| The Yankee Clipper, Joe DiMaggio with the Yankees in 1942. |
DiMaggio, nicknamed "Joltin' Joe" and "The Yankee Clipper", was an
American Major
League Baseball center
fielder who played his entire 13-year career for the New York Yankees.
He is perhaps best known for
his 56-game hitting streak
(May 15 – July 16, 1941), a record that still stands.
DiMaggio's 56-game
streak became one of the most idolized numbers in baseball and joined Babe
Ruth's home run records, and later Wilt Chamberlain's 100-point game, as the
most hallowed records in all of sports. Whenever any player recorded a hit
streak in the mid-thirties, still twenty short of the record, that player would
receive an immense amount of coverage from the media. That's how enormous Joe's
record was.
DiMaggio was a three-time MVP
winner and an All-Star
in each of his 13 seasons.
During his tenure with the Yankees, the club won ten
American League pennants and nine World Series championships.
At the time of his retirement, DiMaggio ranked fifth in
career home runs (361) and
sixth in career slugging
percentage (.579). DiMaggio
finished his career with a lifetime batting average of .325 with 2,214 hits and
1,357 RBIs.
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| Joltin' Joe DiMaggio of the New York Yankees in 1941. |
The New York Yankees retired
DiMaggio’s number 5 jersey in 1952.
He was inducted into the Cooperstown Baseball Hall of Fame
in 1955 with 88.84 percent of the vote on the third ballot in which he
appeared, and was voted the sport's greatest living player in a poll taken
during the baseball centennial year of 1969.
On Sept. 27, 1998, New
York Yankee and Martinez native Joe DiMaggio makes his last public
appearance at Yankee Stadium. Owner George
Steinbrenner presents him with replicas of his 9 World Series rings, which
had been stolen 30 years previously.
In 1999 DiMaggio was named as one
of Major League Baseball’s All-Century Team members.
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