The Key West citizen., 1940-12-18
Began To Boom" In Sep
tember; York, FOXx
And Greenberg Also
Starred
CBy Associated Press)

emily the whit OF q possible fifth
straight pennant for the New
York Yankees propelled big Joe
DiMaggio. premier outfielder of
baseball. into a September hitting
spree that enabled him to retain
for the second year in a row the
clouting championship of the
American League in 1910 The
slight running-dOwn of the four
time flag -grabbers. who could not
quite carry through their stretch
drive, did not appreciably affect
the personal performance of Dl-
Maggie. as so frequently happens
in such circumstances 1t takes a
real hitter to climb in September
when the pitchers are lOOSened UP
at their best. but DiMaggio'S COM
petitive heart carried him on the
wings of momentum to close the
campaign with the leagues pre-
mier mark of .352. This, how
ever. represents a deterioration
of 30 points from his remarkably
high league-leading percentage
of .38l in 1899.
During his finish sprint. Di-
Maggie passed on the paths both
Rip Radcliffe of ST Louis. who had
led the league in swatting most
of the year. and Luke Appling of
Chicago. the leading hitter Of the
circuit in 1886. Appling fell just
four points short Of the top with
an average of .348. while Ted
Williams, the hard-hitting Boston
outfielder. also slipped home
ahead of Radcliff. Williams final
average was .344. and Radcliff's
.342 Two points lower came a
brace of the pennant-winning De
troit sluggers-Barney McCOsky
and Hank Greenberg with iden-
tical averages of $40 each.
Among DiMaggio's 179 blows
for the year were 81 home runs.
as compared with the 80 he hit
in 1899. He also had a total base
figure of 318. as against 80 the
previous season. The hOnOrS in
hOmers went to Greenberg of De-
trOit with A. Proving that he
was a competitor like DiMaggio,
Grecnberg padded Is of his
round -trippers during the pay-Off
days of the Tigers pennant drive
in September This was only
three below the one-month record
of Is made by his teammate and
first-basing successor. Rudy York.
York was third in hOnOrs in the
league in 1910 with 33. The pre-
ViOuS wear Greenberg was second
with 33, as Jimmy FoxX of the
Red Sox hit 35. In 1910 FoXX's
homer total was SO. or one better
than his 1889 list. but it left him in
second place instead of first this
time in this important and spec
tacular factor of the sport. FOXX's
total of SO hOmerS in 1910 made it
the twelfth successive year in
which he had blasted 80 or more
for the route. and his tally of SO
also raised his lifetime big league
count to exactly 500 in IA years.
This places him second to Babe
Ruth in the all-time records. dis
placing Lou Gehrig of the Yam
KEGS who left 494 on the record
books before his career was pre-
maturelv terminated bv illness
Two of Foxx's titanic belts came
with the bases jammed in success
sive games on MAY 90 and 81
against Detroit. Foxx's batting
average in 1910 dropped to 297, a
Shrinkage of 63 points from his
1899 fi>Ire of 800
Total base hOnOrS in 1910 again
were captured by Ted Williams
of Boston with 384-a pickup of
40 over the previous campaign
when he had the high total base
count Cf 344 Williams also took
the lead in total runs scored with
1874. which was five behind the
139 tally Of Red Rolfe of the Yam
KEGS the wear before. In the run
scoriu" feature. Hank Greenberg
who was second high for the sea
son with l29, chalked up one or
more rms per game in Is con-
secutive games from July "a tC
the first gama of a twin-bill on
August 5. inclusive.
In the difficult art of clouting
triples. Barney McCosky of De-
troit was paramount with l9. Tha.
he IS consistent in this clean-hit
ting feature is shown by the fact
that he connected for IA three
baegcrs in 1899. which left him
only two behind the leader OF
that year. Johnny Lewis of Wash
ington. Lewis Sagged off to ten
in 1910. In addition to leading ir
hitting the ball over the fence
Greenberg of Detroit was also SUI
preme in banging it against the
walls. as he came up with a grand
total of so doubles in 1910. This
was four above the leading total