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Today Bill Schaefer continues with his series on the life and career of the great Yankee Clipper, Joe DiMaggio. He even addresses such interesting non-baseball topics as Joe’s relationships with Marilyn Monroe and songwriter Paul Simon. -GL

JOE DIMAGGIO, PART II

DiMAG POST-WAR:

JOE, MARILYN, AND PAUL SIMON

 “It was a very tough team. It was a team where everyone demanded complete effort. We led the league in RA’s—Red Asses—that’s the baseball term for very tough, hard guys. We had more than anyone in the league. Even DiMaggio-elegant as hell, beautiful clothes, always a suit, a gent—but on the field he was a real RA.”-Gene Woodling.

Joe’s three-year hitch in the army was not arduous, “I spent my entire time in the war in Hawaii. I had developed stomach ulcers and they put me in the special services. We played a lot of ball over there and it wasn’t bad duty. The war took a lot more out of guys like Ted Williams and Bob Feller.” DiMaggio felt so guilty he asked to be transferred to combat duty in his third year. The request was denied.

He was a more affable star in 1946, signing autographs by the dozens. But DiMag batted only .290 in his first year back.  “Obviously I was not the same player I was after I came out of the war,” Joe said. “All you have to do is look at the record.” In the seven years before his service interruption, the Clipper had a composite .340 batting average, averaged 133 RBI per season, and, for five consecutive years, hit an average of 34 home runs.

1947 was injury-riddled: March bone spur, July pulled leg muscle, August torn neck muscle followed by a heel issue. Homers and RBI were virtually the same but his batting average improved 25 points to .315. Joe Trimble, New York Daily News sports columnist, crystalized Joltin’ Joe’s value, “DiMaggio is an inspiration to the rest of the club. They just seem to pick up and go into high gear when he shows the way.”

The Bucky Harris-led Yanks cruised to the pennant over Detroit and then beat Brooklyn in a heart-stopping seven games in the first televised World Series. Game Four was historic: Bill Bevens pitched 8 2/3 innings of no-hit ball and then gave up Cookie Lavagetto’s double off the right screen for the win. The classic Red Barber call, in his gentle southern tone, lives on:

“Heah” comes the tying run…and “heah” comes the winning run! And the Dodgers are killin’ Lavagetto!

DiMag won his third MVP in ‘47 beating Ted Williams by a single vote, 202 to 201. Williams buried DiMaggio in every hitting statistic, leading the American League in no less than ten categories, with a whopping OPS+ mark of 205. That’s 105% better than the average player! But just enough writers agreed with Trimble. Joe would spank a pitch off his ear for the game-winning double—Williams would take a ball barely out of his “sweet zone” and walk to first base.

                    OH, THE SUMMER OF ‘49!

 The Bombers didn’t win in 1948, so naturally Bucky Harris was fired. Joe D. had a better year, batting .320 and leading the league with 39 home runs and 155 RBI. Casey Stengel took over the helm in 1949 and the Yankees went on to win a record five straight World championships. Many thought ‘Ol Case was a genius. But the Bombers were so loaded my aunt Tillie could have made out the line-up cards, milked her cows, and won going away.

The pennant race between the Yankees and Red Sox that season was a sizzler to the wire. Two Yankee immortals had been laid to rest during the decade (Gehrig ’41 and Ruth ’48), and now Joe DiMaggio would reach his heroic zenith in a baseball campaign to remember. The Yankee Clipper clobbered the Sox in late June, overcoming a missed half season with a calcified spur in his right heel. In the Yankees’ three-game sweep at Fenway, Joe hit four homers and drove in nine runs.

But undaunted, powerful Boston went on to win 60 of their next 80 games, and roared into Yankee Stadium on October 1, “Joe DiMaggio Day,” [ed. note: see featured photo above from “Joe DiMaggio Day”] needing only one victory out of two remaining games to win the pennant. They couldn’t do it.  After losing 18 pounds battling viral pneumonia most of September, the Clipper had to lean on brother Dom’s shoulder during pregame ceremonies. On his special Saturday, Joe’s face was an ashen grey and he felt weak as a kitten. Somehow, though, he managed two key hits in a Yankee comeback victory. They outlasted Boston on Sunday, October 2, to win the pennant. It was the saddest day of Ted Williams’ career.

Joe batted .381 against the Red Sox in ’49. Overall, in 76 games, he hit .346, belted 14 home runs, and slugged 67 runners across home plate. He had an OBP of .459.

A fine 1950 summer was followed by a dismal, aborted season. On Dec. 19, 1951, Joe DiMaggio addressed the press: “I feel like I have reached the stage where I can no longer produce for my club. I was full of aches and pains and it had been a chore for me to play. When baseball is no longer fun, it’s no longer a game, and so, I’ve played my last game of ball.”

                                JOE AND MARILYN!

 We know four things about Joe DiMaggio. He was a great player, an intensely private man, not good marriage material—and his only true love was Marilyn Monroe. They met on a blind date arranged by a mutual friend. “When I saw him that first night,” said MM, “My first thought was: he’s different.”

After a quiet romance for two years, they were married in the chamber of a Municipal Court judge in San Francisco, on January 15, 1954. They spent their wedding night in a $4 dollar motel. When he was asked whether his marriage to Marilyn Monroe was going to be good for him, Joe answered, “It’s got to be better than rooming with Joe Page.”

Marilyn filed for divorce on October 5, 1954, citing incompatibility. Joe hadn’t changed since his marriage to actress Dorothy Arnold. He didn’t talk to Marilyn for days on end, preferring late-night poker games to her company. Joe admitted, “I know I am wrong in my approach of coldness and indifference. I regret it. But I cannot help it.”

The legendary Lexington Avenue skirt-blowing subway scene, filmed in September, pretty much signaled the end. DiMag exclaimed: “What the hell is this?” as he watched 15 takes in front of 1500 onlookers, completing the filming of The Seven Year Itch. Joe was livid as he watched his wife “too much exposed” and stormed off the set. Later at home, more than one DiMaggio love tap was apparently delivered to the lovely Monroe physiognomy.

But the spark rekindled after the break-up and they were seemingly ready for a second try when Marilyn’s sudden death shocked the world on August 6, 1962. Joe D was devastated. Six red roses would occupy a black metal vase, to be placed at her crypt “twice a week, forever” per Joe’s instructions. 

                         WHAT DID SIMON SAY?

 DiMaggio’s success as a spokesman for the Bowery Bank and Mr. Coffee, in the early ’70s, was assured by his status as a living legend. Not only by his marriage to MM but also by a mention in Ernest Hemmingway’s “The Old Man and the Sea” and a famous lyric in the movie soundtrack for The Graduate.

Word was Joe was going to sue Paul Simon for what he perceived to be a mockery in the line, “Where have you gone, Joe Dimaggio…” from the song, “Mrs. Robinson.” Simon explained, “I met Joe for the first time in an Italian restaurant on Central Park South in ’68 when the song was popular. Joe firmly asked what the line meant since he hadn’t gone anywhere. I explained I wasn’t making fun of him, it was a metaphor. That Joe was a symbol representing a certain kind of departed hero in America. He understood and everything was cool.”

                       TIDBITS and FINAL THOUGHTS

 In addition to his lifetime .325, 361, and 155 OPS+, Joe was an All-Star all 13 years as a Yankee, while his teams captured ten pennants and nine World Series.  Furthermore:

• He became the first player to break $100,000 in earnings, in 1949, (70K plus bonuses).
• Three MVP awards (’39, ’41, ’47).
• Hall Of Fame, 1955.
• Voted Baseball’s Greatest Living Player during baseball’s Centennial Year, 1969.
• Stole home five times during his career.
• Possibly even more impressive than his 56-game hitting streak, DiMag holds the record for most seasons with more home runs than strikeouts (min 20 homers). A feat he accomplished seven times! (Berra-5, Kluzewski-4, Dickey-3, Mize-3, O’Doul-3, Williams-3, Gehrig-2)
• From his hospital bed in 1999, Joe triggered the 14-year emotional reunion between George Steinbrenner and Yogi Berra.

His name seems synonymous with class, grace, distance, icon, majesty, mystique, greatness, and team player. He is there forever in Monument Park at Yankee Stadium with Ruth, Gehrig, Huggins, and Mantle.

“I’m just a ballplayer with one ambition—to give all I’ve got to help my ball club win. I’ve never played any other way.”

Bill Schaefer

Sources:  Daily News Legends Series, Joe DiMaggio, 1914-1999; Summer Of ’49, David Halberstam; Red Sox Schedule Almanac, 1949; Joe D baseball ref; Ted Williams baseball ref; Joe DiMaggio, obit, 1999, NY Times: Yankees schedule almanac, 1949. Google search: DiMaggio spokesman Bowery Bank, Mr. Coffee.

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