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Show I SPEAKING OF i SPORTS II I By ROBERT McSHANE ; ? ' o laleoiad by Wtrn Newtpopat Union j! IN SELECTING Joe DiMaggio as the American league's most valuable valu-able player for 1941, the Baseball Writers Association of America honored hon-ored an athlete whose name will be remembered as long as baseball is played. I The slugging outfielder for the New York Yankees, who set the . baseball world on fire with a record string of hits in 56 consecutive! games last season, was similarly honored in 1939. Last year's most valuable player was not in the running run-ning for this year's award. Hank Grccnberg of the Detroit Tigers, first choice of the writers in 1940, spent most of the 1941 season in the army and had no opportunity to repeat. re-peat. During his six-year career with the Yankees, Joe never has hit low- j er than .323, never has totaled less i than 29 home runs and never has j batted in fewer than 125 runs. He hatted .357 in 139 games in 1941. : His consecutive hitting streak this j season started May 15 with a single I off Edgar Smith of the Chicago' White Sox and continued until July 18 when the string was broken by ' Cleveland Pitchers Al Smith and Jim Bagby. The selection wasn't a simple matter. After all, Bob Feller's 25 pitching victories for the Cleveland Indians were high in the league. Boston's Ted Williams outstripped Cecil Travis of Washington, his nearest rival for the batting title, by 47 points. Williams hit .406. Fifteen of the 24 committeemen for the baseball writers cast first place votes for Joe and the other nine approved him for second. Eight committeemen nominated Williams for first, 14 for second and two for third. Feller was named by 14 for third place, six for fourth, one for fifth, two for sixth and one for seventh. sev-enth. DiMaggio played for the San Francisco Seals In the Pacific Coast league for three full seasons and part or 1932. He was sold to the Yankees for $25,000 and five players in 1934 but did not join the New Y'ork club until two years later. He has been a member of the American Amer-ican league All-Star game squad every year since he came to the majors. Though the price paid for Joe wasn't peanuts, the Yankees consider con-sider it one of the best investments ever made by the club. His value to the world champions can't be measured solely by statistics. His 56-game hitting streak meant a great deal more than is evidenced by the record book. |