Joe DiMaggio's record 56-game hitting streak was even more outrageous than you know

New York Yankees legend Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak is held in incredibly high esteem in the annals of baseball lore. The MLB hitting streak record is one of the most well-known records there is in the history of all organized athletics, both in terms of identity of the record-holder and the number reached.

Full disclosure: I am not as big a hitting streak mystique guy as most; ordinarily I’m not inclined to hold hitting streaks – including DiMaggio’s all-timer – to the same level of reverence as the consensus seemingly does. But recently I noticed something that I’ve never in my life seen any evidence of anyone else broaching or in any way being aware of. Something that takes DiMaggio’s record streak, and makes it exponentially more unlikely, all the way into the realm of the fantastical. Allow me to briefly explain the rationale behind my hitting streak stance, before I promise I’ll totally redeem myself in the eyes of you lovers of DiMaggio’s streak. 

Before making said recent discovery, my attitude toward his hitting streak was this: Ok, so it occurred in 1941, spanning from May 15th - July 16th. In that time, he accumulated a total of 91 hits. Which, and this isn’t surprising, is not the most any big leaguer’s ever had across a 56-game stretch. What is a bit surprising is that it’s not even close. There have been a ton of other instances in which a big leaguer compiled far more hits across a period of 56 games (DiMaggio in the same season included).

Right off the bat (baseball term) my mind would go to, say, ‘04 Ichiro Suzuki, who had a 56-game stretch spanning July 8th - September 9th in which he didn’t just have more hits than the 91 DiMaggio amassed throughout his 56-game hitting streak, but over 26% more. Nearly a half-hit more per game.

I refuse to subscribe to the widely-believed theory that said '41 DiMaggio 56-game stretch was a galactically and/or fundamentally more impressive/remarkable feat than, for instance, that '04 Ichiro 56-game stretch purely on the basis that the specific distribution of DiMaggio's much fewer hits happens to be perceived merely as much more serendipitous.

Here are each of those two 56-game stretches, charted in a couple different ways:

Even a toddler could easily discern how much more turquoise is going on there than gray. I don’t care that Ichiro had five hitless games (and in one of them he left the contest after getting hit by a pitch in just the third inning); he didn’t have just a little more overall racking up of hits, he had a ton more.

The other thing that doesn’t make sense to me is the seemingly arbitrary nature as to why it’s “games with at least one hit” that’s become by far the most renowned streak in sports. No other potential streak is even considered in the same stratosphere. Every baseball fan of even the most casual variety knows DiMaggio holds the record for most consecutive games with at least one hit, and everyone knows that number is 56.

Do even the biggest die-hards know off the top of their head the record for most consecutive games with at least one extra-base hit (back in ‘06, Chipper Jones tied the record of 14 held by ‘27 Paul Waner)? How ‘bout with at least one RBI (‘22 Ray Grimes with 17)? At least one stolen base (‘69 Bert Campaneris with 12)? What about instead of consecutive games with at least one hit, consecutive games with at least two hits (‘23 Rogers Hornsby with 13)?

And my personal favorite, the one that’s the most bewildering to be considered so much less significant than consecutive games getting a hit at least once, is consecutive games reaching base safely at least once. The mostly unknown standard-bearer in that regard is ‘49 Ted Williams, who pulled off doing so in 84 consecutive games – so when including walks, he reached a number exactly 50% higher than DiMaggio’s famed 56. The reason for the wildly disparate levels of familiarity between those two streaks is completely beyond me.

Even extending beyond MLB, it’s safe to say the records for most consecutive NBA games with at least, say, one official blocked shot (Patrick Ewing with 154) or one made 3-pointer (Steph Curry’s admittedly the predictable answer, but not the number of 231) aren’t common knowledge. Ditto for most consecutive NFL games, say, passing for at least one touchdown (Drew Brees with 60) or scoring at least one touchdown (Lenny Moore set the record at 17 in the days before the Super Bowl era, which has since been tied by Christian McCaffrey … the Niner fan in me, however, feels compelled to point out that Moore’s streak happened to get extended on the back of a fortuitous recovery of a teammate’s fumble).

Why in the world should consecutive MLB games with at least one hit be that much more illustrious than any of those other streaks (or plenty of potential others I didn’t touch on)? It’s also not even as though DiMaggio’s hitting streak lore stems from no one else having ever even come close; indeed there have been several instances where guys have crafted a streak that got into the 40s.

But! That long windup leads me to this pitch; the discovery I made which has transformed me from holding his streak in lower esteem than just about anyone to perhaps higher esteem than anyone, even the biggest fans of either the Yankees or just that 56-game hitting streak.

And here it is: in one of the 56 games of DiMaggio’s streak – the game that extended his streak to 14 – rain cut it short, killing it after just the fifth inning.

But wait, there’s more. In a second of the 56 games – the game that extended his streak to 44 – rain cut it short, killing it after just the fifth inning.

But wait, I kid you not, there’s more. In a third of the 56 games – the game that extended his streak to 49 – rain cut it short, killing it after just the fifth inning.

Even one game that short is extremely rare. For context, outside of those three (3) Yankee games, there was only one (1) such MLB game that season that didn’t involve ‘em. Which means they did thrice that which the vast majority of big league squads did zero times, and which zero other squads did even twice.

In fact, throughout the 85 years-and-counting since then, no other team’s ever played three games in an entire season that failed to bleed into the sixth inning (the ‘46 A’s, ‘68 Twins, and ‘71 Royals played three games in which there wasn’t a bottom of the sixth, but at least one of the three games had a top of the sixth), let alone within a two-month time frame. Only the ‘41 Yanks, with the entirety of their uniquely rare abundance of extremely truncated games that inherently and severely undermine the continuation of any sort of streak … and the lengthiest hitting streak of all time … somehow intersecting!

To further underscore the rarity of a big league game not extending past the fifth inning: there were recently back-to-back MLB seasons in 2017 and 2018 in which there wasn’t a single instance of any squad not getting to bat into the sixth inning. Hell, the Diamondbacks, Astros, and Mariners, across their entire histories, have combined to play just one game in which they didn’t get to bat past the fifth.

For all the hoopla that has percolated for decades surrounding the streak, again, I have never in my life seen any reference or acknowledgement of those incredibly aggravating circumstances. Booby traps of the highest degree. The ultimate threat to blow to smithereens any effort to keep alive any sort of consecutive games streak (in which something was actually accomplished, sorry Ripken). Yet in all three games, DiMaggio managed to get a hit in the early stages of the game to avoid what would’ve been a heartbreaking way for it to end. There can’t be a more devastating manner for the streak to have met its demise than the final four innings just getting wiped away.

But it didn’t. He wouldn’t allow it to derail him. And he deftly navigated that threat not just once. Or twice. But three times. And it’s that fact, in my opinion, that oughta henceforth be the foremost element of the streak that’s celebrated.

So if and when somebody one day comes along and pieces together a hitting streak that reaches 57 games, or 75 games, or even 100 games, it’s safe to say they likely won’t have had to overcome even one game with four innings chopped off, let alone three such games. 

And because of that, I think DiMaggio’s would still be the more remarkable streak. The number 56 possibly – perhaps even probably – won’t stand the test of time for the longest hitting streak in MLB history. But even if it doesn't, DiMaggio -- and the unique way he got there -- should.