Jackson: Vince DiMaggio, semi-favorite son
From SABR member Frank Jackson at The Hardball Times on June 2, 2016:
Pity poor Vince DiMaggio. He had a respectable 10-year major league career, which places him in a very small minority of humanity (in his day, a mere 400 men were major league ballplayers at any time), and would make him the envy of most of his peers. Yet he wasn’t the best player in his family. In fact, he wasn’t even second best, so he never got the respect he deserved. Not too many people, other than Jesus Alou or Rodney Dangerfield, could empathize with his plight.
Best known of the DiMaggio clan (there were nine children – a baseball team in itself), of course, is Joe DiMaggio (born in 1914), an American icon, a Yankee legend, a household word even among non-baseball fans, truly a man who needs no introduction, certainly not to visitors to this website.
Less renowned, but a formidable presence nonetheless, was Dom DiMaggio (born in 1917), the youngest. Dom was no national icon, but he had an outstanding career as a player and a lengthy post-baseball career as a businessman. Like Joe, Dom played his entire career with one team (the Red Sox) in the American League.
Read the full article here: http://www.hardballtimes.com/semi-favorite-son/
Originally published: June 3, 2016. Last Updated: June 3, 2016.