Joe DiMaggio and Yankee Stadium Were Not Good Friends

Yankee Stadium was not Joe DiMaggio's "friend."

Mickey Mantle, whom many consider almost DiMaggio's equal, claimed that he and good pal Whitey Ford witnessed many deep DiMaggio drives that were caught at Yankee Stadium but that would be home runs in any other ball park.

Bill James determined that no player in history lost more home runs due to his home ball park than DiMaggio.

Left-center field was 457 ft. from home plate. At the Yankees' new ball park, the distance is 399 ft.

DiMaggio hit 148 home runs in 3,360 at-bats at home. He hit 213 home runs in 3,461 at-bats on the road. His slugging percentage at home was .546, and on the road, it was .610.

Baseball historian Bill Jenkins wrote that each time DiMaggio stepped into the batter's box at Yankee Stadium, he knew that is was impossible for him to hit a home run to the half of the field that was directly in front of him.

"If you look at a baseball field from foul line to foul line, it has a 90-degree radius. From the power alley in left center field (430 in Joe's time) to the fence in deep right center field (407 ft), it is 45-degrees. And Joe DiMaggio never hit a single home run over the fences at Yankee Stadium in that 45-degree graveyard. It was just too far.  If he had hit the same exact pattern of batted balls with a typical modern stadium as his home, he would have belted about 225 homers during his home field career."

DiMaggio rarely benefited from the short foul line distances, but the cavernous outfield made up for the few "cheapies."  DiMaggio hit only 41 percent of his home runs at Yankee Stadium.

Ted Williams faced similar problems at Fenway Park as DiMaggio faced at Yankee Stadium. The distance to right center field was 405 ft. when Williams started his career and was decreased to 380 ft. in 1943.

According to ESPN, Dave Anderson of the New York Times wrote that Tom Yawkey, who owned the Boston Red Sox and Dan Topping, who was the Yankees' co-owner with Del Webb, made the tentative trade but decided to wait a day before finalizing it.

The next morning, Yawkey told Topping that he wanted the Yankees little left fielder included in the trade. Topping refused to include Yogi Berra and the trade never occurred.

I don't believe ESPN.

Anyway, the fact remains that DiMaggio would be rated even more highly had he played in a ball park that was friendlier to right-handed hitters than Yankee Stadium.