December 11 has been a busy day. This is the date the designated hitter was first proposed. You'll be surprised to learn it was proposed by the National League president and the year was 1928. Hats off to the NL for resisting this travesty for so long.
In 1951, the Yankee Clipper, Joltin' Joe Dimaggio, retired. Joe is remembered for hitting baseballs and pitching Mr. Coffee machines.
And in 1959, the Kansas City A's shipped Roger Maris to the Yankees. Roger, of course, ended up hitting 61 homeruns in 1961 to eclipse Babe Ruth's single season record. Since he played in a 162 game season (as opposed to Babe's 154 game season) the record was awarded an asterisk. Paradoxically, baseball hasn't seen the need to include an asterisk beside the names of the steroid inflated home run totals of the folks who eclipsed Maris' mark.
In 12 seasons Roger played in seven Word Series including two in his last two years in the majors with St. Louis. In return the Anheuser Busch brewery gave him a distributorship which they later took back. After prolonged litigation which included a $50 million dollar jury award and a multi-billion dollar defamation suit. The suit was eventually settled out of court. There's gratitude for you.
