Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio
were two of the greatest baseball players of all time. No one will refute that.
The two men have been linked together since the magical Summer of 1941 when
both men officially put the mark on their respective Hall of Fame careers:
DiMaggio hit in 56 consecutive games and Williams became the last man to hit
.400, marks that have stood for more than eight decades and that no one in the
sport has come close to matching ever since.
Both men are icons for their
respective teams, though in the case of DiMaggio he was ‘only’ the third in the
list of Yankee legends to play in the teams remarkable four decade dominance of
baseball, starting with the arrival of Babe Ruth and ending – temporarily - in 1964 when the Yankee dynasty collapsed.
The two are inexorably linked because they represent ‘the greatest rivalry in
the history of baseball’, although during the 20th century there was
no contest as to who the better franchise was. (Things have shifted in the Red
Sox direction during this one.) But because DiMaggio and Williams’s career
intersected during the brief period in the 1940s when the Red Sox looked like
they were going to be a dynasty, the two outfielders are linked in the way that
few Red Sox players during this period were. Indeed for much of that period the
biggest link the two teams had were the players who got traded between the
franchises with the Yankees inevitably getting the better of the deal.
And because both men were at
their peak during this period, the debate has lingered: just who was better,
Williams or DiMaggio. It’s worth noting that at the time Boston sportswriters
built the idea that DiMaggio was the better player because according to them
DiMaggio was a clutch hitter and Williams had gaudy statistics but never came
through when the Red Sox needed him too. That is unfair to Williams and it’s
not particularly fair to DiMaggio: the Yankees did just fine after he retired
in 1951 and most of the time they won the pennant by such huge margins that
even when DiMaggio wasn’t doing well, the Yankees did pretty well.
So with the distance of time,
perhaps we can actually ask a different question: when both men were playing at
the same time in the American League, who was the better player: Jolting Joe or
the Splendid Splinter?
This is actually fairer than it
might sound. Williams was a rookie in 1939 and DiMaggio at the time was
starting his fourth season in the majors. Both men missed the same three year
period due to their service in World War II: 1943-1945. And both men did suffer
major injuries during the end of the decade that hurt their productivity.
DiMaggio missed the first six weeks of the 1949 season due to bone spurs and
only played half of the season and Williams suffered a broken wrist halfway through
the 1950 season which ended a brilliant season for him.
So in this article I will look
at Williams’s and DiMaggio’s performance during the period where the two men
were directly competing against each other (and making pitchers in the American
League miserable): 1939-1942 and 1946-1951.
For the record I will not use
sabermetrics but only their basic statistics as well as where they ranked in
the standings in the American League in the seasons they played. I think that’s
a fair comparison as we’re also comparing them to the rest of the league.
1939
Williams broke in with the Red
Sox and had arguably the greatest rookie season of all time: he hit .327 with
31 home runs and drove in 145 runs, which more than led the American League.
(In fact he led both leagues in that category. He also led the lead in total
bases with 344, was second in Doubles and runs scored and fourth in slugging
percentage. Had there been a Rookie of the Year award, he would have been the
unanimous winner.
Nevertheless DiMaggio
outperformed him by a considerable amount that year. He batted .381, drove in
126 runs, hit 30 home runs, and was second in the American League in slugging
percentage. He did all this even though he missed six weeks of the season with
an injury which does boggle the mind. He won his first Most Valuable Player
award and he thoroughly deserved it.
1940
Williams received such booing
during this season that he vowed never to tip his cap after a home run because
of it. And if Boston fans considered his second year performance disappointing,
I actually side with Williams. He hit .344, second in the league to DiMaggio,
hit 23 home runs and drove in 113 runs. He was third in total bases, led the
league in runs scored and was among the top five in doubles and triples. Apparently
Boston fans are harsher even when they have a legend.
The Yankees did not win the
American League Pennant that year (the only time between 1936 and 1943 that
didn’t happen) but DiMaggio had another great season. He batted .354 for his
second batting title, hit 31 home runs and drove in 133 runs. He was just
behind Williams in total bases and second in the league slugging percentage. DiMaggio
was slightly better than Williams that year. However Hank Greenberg had a
monster season and when the Tigers won the American League pennant, Greenberg
won his second MVP. Apparently DiMaggio was booed at Yankee Stadium too that
year.
1941
Trying to decide who had the
better year in 1941 is trickier than it sounds and DiMaggio did end up beating
Williams for the MVP that year. Williams’s 1941 season has been racked by many
statisticians as arguably the best single season a hitter had whose name was
not Babe Ruth. In addition to his .406 average, Williams led the league in home
runs, slugging percentage, bases on balls and runs scored.
But DiMaggio’s season was,
obviously, not that bad. He batted .357, drove in 125 runs to lead the American
League (Williams finished fourth that year with ‘only’ 120) was second in runs
scored and slugging to Williams, finished ahead of him in doubles and was the
league leader in total bases with 348. You throw in that the Yankees won the
pennant by 17 games after finishing third the previous year as well as the 56
game hitting streak, I can’t understand why the sportswriters named DiMaggio
MVP in 1941.
Williams obviously had the
better season but all things considered, I’m still inclined to put them at dead
even for this year.
1942
There’s no question who the
better player in 1942 was by any metric. Ted Williams won his first triple
crown: he hit .356 with 31 home runs and 137 runs driven in. He also led the
league in total bases, runs scored and slugging percentage. DiMaggio, by
contrast, had was to that point his first ‘off-season’ in his seven years in
baseball: he ‘only’ hit .305 with 21 home runs and 114 runs batted in. He was
better in other categories, among the league leaders in total bases, runs
scored and triples – and he and Williams tied with 186 hits apiece.
The problem was not that
DiMaggio was named MVP and Williams wasn’t it was that the American League MVP
that year went to Yankees second baseman Joe Gordon in one of the strangest
choices the sportswriters had made to that point in the awards history. It would have made more sense
to name DiMaggio or Charlie Keller, another Yankee outfielder Most Valuable
Player. By naming Gordon it really did seem like the sportswriters were
demonstrating an pro-Yankee bias or more likely an anti Ted Williams one. Sadly
it was far from the last time it would happen, even in this brief period.
We start up again in 1946 after both
men, like the rest of America, returned home at the end of World War II.
1946
DiMaggio was not himself when he
returned from his hiatus. He hit .290 with 25 home runs and 95 RBIs, career
lows for him and the first time he’d never hit .300.
Williams by contrast came back
swinging – literally. He batted .342, hit 38 home runs and drove in 123 runs. He
finished second in all three categories – batting average to Washington’s
Mickey Vernon, the latter two categories to Hank Greenberg – so some argued
that he only received his first MVP because the Red Sox won the American League
Pennant. What that fails to account is that he led the league in slugging
percentage, runs scored and total bases, just as he had done in 1941 and
1942. He also was among the league
leaders in hits and doubles and walked 156 times, positively Ruthian numbers.
There’s no question he earned this one.
DiMaggio by contrast only
managed to finish in the top five in home runs and slugging percentage. The
talk around the league was that he might be washed up.
1947
This one’s a dilly. Williams won
his second triple crown, batting .343, with 32 home runs and 114 RBIs. He also
led the league in total bases, runs scored and slugging percentage and was
walked 163 times.
DiMaggio’s season was a slight
improvement from 1946 – he hit .315 with 20 home runs and drove in 97 runs and
was second in total bases and slugging percentage to Williams. Still there was
no question who the best hitter in the American League was that year. What’s
more DiMaggio’s numbers were not the most impressive among his own teammates.
In the clearest example his fellow outfielder Tommy Henrich drove in 98
runs, scored 109 runs and hit 35 more doubles, easily surpassing DiMaggio’s
figures in all three categories.
Yet DiMaggio was named the American
League MVP – by one vote over Williams. Williams would point out justifiably
one of the critical factors that a notable Boston sportswriter named Mel Webb
left Williams off his ballot completely. Had he received even a tenth-place
vote Williams would have been the MVP. There’s more to the story than that,
obviously, but it does how Williams’s reputation with the Boston media – which was
one of mutual loathing – affected his reputation at the time, particularly in
comparison with DiMaggio.
1948
The American League enjoyed one
of the great pennant races in baseball history in this year with Boston,
Cleveland and New York fighting all season for the pennant. The Yankees would
be eliminated on the next-to-last day of the season and the Red Sox would
famously lose a one-game playoff to Cleveland.
Williams and DiMaggio each had
one of their greatest seasons, though they would lose the MVP to Cleveland’s
player-manager Lou Boudreau who also had one of the great seasons in major
league history. Keeping that in mind, let’s focus on DiMaggio and Williams.
Williams batting .369, winning
his fourth batting title and also led the league in slugging percentage and
doubles. He hit 25 home runs, drove in 127 runs and scored 124 runs.
DiMaggio hit .320 but hit 39
home runs and drove in 155, both of which were enough to lead the American
League. He also led the league in total bases with 355 forty more than Williams.
He was second in slugging percentage to Williams but was also among the league leaders in hits and triples.
Now there’s no question Boudreau
deserved the MVP that year: in addition to posting offensive numbers that were
among the highest for a shortstop to that point history, he was also the team
manager had more pressure on him than Williams or DiMaggio did. But among the
two men in question, I think I have to give the edge to the Yankee Clipper in
this one. Even in the last game, after the Yankees had been eliminated, he
played all nine innings and hit two singles and two doubles. He never gave up.
1949
This one is an easy one because
DiMaggio missed the first six weeks of the season and only came to bat 272
times that year. His .346 average, fourteen home runs and sixty seven RBIs are
impressive but despite the stories you hear (and I may tell some of them later)
DiMaggio was not the best player in the American League.
Williams clearly was. He batted
.343, with 43 home runs and 159 runs driven in. He missed his third triple
crown by an eyelash. He led the American League in total bases, runs scored,
doubles and slugging percentage and was second only to Dale Mitchell in hits.
He walked a ridiculous amount – 162 times, second only to Babe Ruth for a
single season, He won his second American League MVP deservedly.
But whatever possibility the Red
Sox had for a dynasty dissolved on the final day of the 1949 season. The Red
Sox had come close to winning two consecutive American League pennants only to
lose them both on the final day of the season. Williams would never get this
close to one for the rest of his career and I have little doubt his reputation
began to dissolve still further for that period in Boston.
1950
At the All-Star break of the
1950 season Williams was hitting .321 with 25 home runs and 83 RBIS. While
catching a liner of the bat of Ralph Kiner, he fractured his elbow, missed a third
of the season. He finished hitting. 317 with 28 home runs and 97 RBIs. It took
him out of contention for most of the league leaders – and was no doubt a big part of how the Red Sox who had one of
the best offensive seasons in history, lost the American League pennant by four
games to the Yankees.
DiMaggio was a shell of his
former self in 1950 but that shell was still very capable of doing amazing
things. He hit .301, with 32 home runs and drove in 122 runs. He led the league
in slugging percentage and managed 307 total bases.
DiMaggio might get this by
default but it was an impressive season anyway. He was among the league leaders
in home runs and RBIs and would have been a better choice for MVP then Phil
Rizutto, in my opinion. (So would Yogi Berra for that matter but that’s neither
here nor there.)
1951
This was DiMaggio’s last season
for a reason. He batted .263 with 12 home runs and 71 runs driven in. He knew
he no longer had it and rather than hang around any longer he chose to leave
the stage after the Yankees won the World Series.
Williams was the better player
that year by far, hitting .318 with 31 home runs and driving in 126 runs. He
led the league in slugging percentage and total bases, scored 109 runs and was
walked a ridiculous number of times. So naturally the writers gave the MVP to
Yogi Berra.
No I won’t trash Yogi. During
the 1950s he was deservedly one of the most respected players in the game. He deservedly
won the MVP in 1954 and 1955, finished second in 1950, 1953 and 1956 and fourth
in 1952. I could argue he deserved to win in 1950 as much in any of those years
and let’s not pretend he wasn’t revolutionizing the position of catching in
more ways then one. And for the record Williams thought he was one of the
greatest hitters he’d ever seen.
Conclusion
The two men actually matched up
better than I expected when I began writing this article. Williams was clearly
the better player in both his MVP season as well as the two in which he won the
Triple Crown. Comparing the two men in DiMaggio’s season isn’t strictly fair,
but let’s count it for the record.
But DiMaggio was clearly better than Williams at the start of
his career and compares very well with him in several critical marks. The two
men were better matched in 1941 than it would seem at first glance and DiMaggio
was clearly statistically superior in 1948 to Williams. It might not be fair to
compare DiMaggio to Williams in 1950 but the fact that DiMaggio was not only
lagging quite a bit but had to take more rests than usual does lead me to think
the two men might have finished favorably had Williams had been hurt.
DiMaggio hit 260 home runs and
drove in 1105 runs during this period. Williams hit 273 home runs and drove in
1208. Williams scored 1295 runs. DiMaggio scored 978.
That last statistic speaks to
one way Williams is clearly superior to DiMaggio. DiMaggio spent his entire
career as a player surrounding by superb hitters around him, Tommy Henrich and
Charlie Keller at the start of his career, Berra at the end of it. DiMaggio had
all sorts of protection.
Williams by contrast never had
anyone close to as good as him in the lineup. There would be some Hall of
Famers – Bobby Doerr and Jimmy Foxx – as well as some very good hitters – Vern Stephens
and Johnny Pesky but Williams was walked an absurd amount of the time because
it was safer to do that and pitch to the next man down. That’s part of the
reasons his numbers took such a nosedive in the latter stages of his career; he
was still hitting as well as ever but there was no one base to drive ahead of
him.
And it’s also the reason why his
peak ended not long after DiMaggio’s career ended. Don’t get me wrong he was
still as he himself put it ‘the greatest old hitter alive’, capable of batting
.388 at 39 and winning a battle title when he was 40. And it’s not like his power
disappeared: he hit 29 home runs at the age of 42. But the rest of the
offensive lineup was, frankly, inoffensive. After he came back from Korea he
never drove in more than 89 runs the rest of his career. There were some solid
hitters in the lineup during the 1950s – Jackie Jensen and Frank Malzone – but they
did not strike fear into the hearts of pitchers the way Williams still could at
40.
DiMaggio drove in 100 runs or
more six times during this period. Williams drove in 100 runs every year but
1950 and that was due to extenuating circumstances. To be a little fairer
DiMaggio drove in 120 runs four of those times and Williams did seven
times.
Williams hit 30 home runs or
more seven times during this period. DiMaggio did so 5 times. Williams hit 40
or more four times and DiMaggio never came close. To be fair DiMaggio only hit
40 home runs once in his entire career, when he hit 46 home runs in 1937; it
was not easy to hit that many in the House that Ruth Built.
Williams won four of his six batting titles during
this period; DiMaggio won two. DiMaggio did manage to hit .350 three times
during this period, the exact number as Williams did. DiMaggio, it’s worth
noting, did flirt with .400 in 1939 before settling down at .381. Williams next
highest total was .369, while DiMaggio hit .357 in 1942.
It was famously said DiMaggio
only had one weakness: doubles. He hit 288 of his 390 during this period as
well as 88 of his 131 triples. Williams hit 396 doubles during this period but
only hit 61 triples. And it must be added how much he was walked: Williams led
the league in walks almost every year during this period, getting more than 140
seven times. DiMaggio by contrast never was walked as many as 100 times
during his entire career: his highest total was 80 and that was in his
next to last season. That’s the thing about the Yankees; there was no such
thing as an easy out.
And it is worth noting DiMaggio
was, if anything, harder to strike out than Williams was; he only struck out
361 times in his entire career. His highest total was 39 in his rookie
year, which means his batting eye only got better from that point on. And for
all of Williams’s incredible eyesight, pitchers did have a better chance of
striking him out than DiMaggio. He struck out 45 times or more five times
during this same period. Bob Feller might have thought he had a better chance to
strike out Williams than DiMaggio.
At the end of the day I think Williams was a better hitter
than DiMaggio during the period they were in direct competition but the margins
are far closer than I expected them to be. Of course when it comes to who the
better human being was that’s no contest – but I’ll save that for
another article.
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