This Day in Baseball History (DiMag Begins 56-Game Hitting Streak)

May 15, 1941—When he punched a single off southpaw Eddie Smith in the first inning, all Joe DiMaggio wanted was some kind of a spark, either for himself or his team. That lone hit that day, in the midst of a 13-1 drubbing at the hands of the Chicago White Sox, didn’t seem to lift either his fortunes or the New York Yankees.

Little did anyone know that this was exactly what he was seeking, as he began a 56-game hitting streak that not only remains the most difficult of batting records to equal or surpass (proved yet again this season by Andre Ethier’s, which stopped at a mere 30) but that also lifted the Bronx Bombers from an early-season funk to another World Series triumph.

I have written several prior posts on the Yankee Clipper, with perhaps my favorite—how he returned from a devastating injury to pulverize the Boston Red Sox—here. But the streak (in baseball, really, is there any other?) might be his one individual achievement that remains unassailable.

So remarkable was this record that it upstaged another offensive milestone that season: Ted Williams’ .406 batting average, the last time that the .400 mark has been achieved.

For a long time, I wondered why the Yankee Clipper—whose batting average in this magical season, .357, was still only third that year, behind Williams’ and the Washington Senators’ Cecil Travis—was named Most Valuable Player instead of the Splendid Splinter. In essence, I think it came down to two reasons: a) DiMaggio’s unsurpassed all-around offensive and defensive excellence; and b) his importance to a team that, once again, won it all.

It sure wasn’t shaping up that way through the first several weeks of the season. When DiMaggio dug in against Smith, his average was only .306—not bad for almost anyone else, but a real falloff for a two-time batting champion. And that doesn’t even begin to convey the level of futility to which he sank early on: .194 after 20 games.

With DiMaggio, in effect, catching a cold at the plate, the Yankees were coming down with the flu: losers, at the time of the White Sox matchup, of four games in a row, seven out of their last nine—leaving them 5 ½ games out of first and falling fast.

Even for a few weeks after the streak began, people were more likely to notice this graceful outfielder’s uncharacteristic miscues (four errors in a Memorial Day doubleheader against the hated Red Sox) than his quiet assault on the record books. Indeed, the streak didn’t gain its irresistible amount—its sheer magnitude—until DiMaggio’s return to the team after attending Lou Gehrig’s funeral. The offensive display he mounted then—three hits that day, three homers and a double in a double-header the next—almost seemed to announce: The Captain might be dead, but now I’ll carry you.

And carry them he did, as America, watching the anxiety-inducing news from abroad, began to pay rapt attention to a hero it badly needed. By the time the streak ended against the Cleveland Indians, DiMaggio had batted .408 over this remarkable span with 91 hits (including 16 doubles, four triples and 15 homeruns); scored 56 runs; driven in 55 runs; and achieved 160 total bases. Especially crucial to these statistics was his ability simply to put the ball into play: this great power hitter only struck out seven times.

In the process, DiMaggio lifted the team, as he would again eight years later in his dramatic midseason return from injury against the Bosox. The Yankees vaulted into first place in ’41, finishing 17 games ahead of the Red Sox. His team knew exactly what he meant to them: after the streak ended, they threw a surprise hotel party in which they presented him with a cigar humidor (courtesy of Tiffany’s) with the engraved autographs of all his teammates.

Long before Hemingway's Santiago confided this piece of wisdom to a young boy in The Old Man and the Sea, the Yankees already knew the truth of his saying: "Trust in the great DiMaggio."

The streak played an enormous part in making DiMaggio an American legend, but it also underscored the contradictions at the heart of this deeply complicated human being. On the one hand, it attracted so many autograph seekers that he once said he wouldn’t have wanted the record if he had known it would lead to this.

On the other hand, when a friend visiting the dying Hall of Famer told him that someone he met claimed to have seen the 58-game streak, the proud DiMaggio mustered the last reserves of strength from a body that had slugged the ball at will nearly six decades before, pulled his friend by the sleeve, and whispered: “It’s 56.”

Today, the blog Bleacher Report begins a "real-time" series in which it tracks each day of the streak set by the Yankee Clipper. What a great way to spotlight a great record that, even in the age of steroids, managed to be impervious to serious challenge. (It might be tougher to achieve than even a .400 season; while you can count on a great day to compensate for a bad one to achieve the stellar batting average, to match DiMaggio's record you simply cannot have an off day.)