On a rainy weekend, possibly just weeks, perhaps days before his death, the Boston Red Sox finally decided to retire Johnny Pesky’s number. Ole Numero Six was a member of the organization off and on, in one way or another, for about 150 years. The team even named a foul pole in Fenway Park after the man with the unfortunate nickname of “The Needle,” as payback for his hesitating on a throw in 1946 that cost the Sox the World Series. But now they’ve given him the ultimate kudos.
Pesky joins Carlton Fisk, Carl Yastrzemski, the frozen head of Ted Williams, and a couple of other guys no one alive has ever heard of (though neither are believed to have been named any version of “Carl”) as players whose number the Sox have retired.
With the team becoming more lax with the number retiring, focus has now shifted to who in the Sam Hill might be next. This attention has gone not to Tony Conigliaro, Jim Rice or Rey Quinones, but to 11-year Sox vet Dominic DiMaggio, brother of legendary New York Yankee player and Marilyn Monroe nailer Joe DiMaggio. But fans in Beantown are saying, “Thanks, but no thanks, Dominic, you Italian Christmas donkey, you.”
In later years the Red Sox would sign players like Mike Maddux and Jeremy Giambi, the Don Swayze and Frank Stallone of their respective families. If there was a Zeppo Yastrzemski, you can bet your sweet bippy he would have been on the team and Carl would have been playing elsewhere. So Dominic is no more welcome on the Fenway wall of fame than Roger Clinton or Rufus Obama.
Polls in the Boston area reveal that fans would rather see the team retire the number of pitcher Clarence Blethen, who played just five games for the Sox way back in 1923. Blethen was perhaps known most for once sliding into a base with his false teeth in his back pocket, and being injured when he, yes – bit himself on the ass.
So clearly, as good a player as Dommy D was, he wasn’t “Joltin’” and he was nobody’s “Clipper.” Paul Simon never asked where Dominic went. In fact, I’m not sure if brother Joe even cared where this non-Hall of Famer scurried off to. (FYI – The Dommer will be 92 years young in February!)
The truly laughable part of all this is that Vince DiMaggio – the third brother, the Shemp, of the DiMaggio family – began his career with the Boston Bees. Legend has it that Carmine “Three Fingers” DiMaggio never made it to the Majors because he just couldn’t hold a bat.
So, piss off, Dom DiMaggio. The Sox have chicken man/hair transplant pusher/Margo Adams’ favorite ballplayer Wade Boggs’ number to retire next year. Not to mention perhaps maybe someday that of steroid king and alleged statuary rapist Roger Clemens. And if the Sox are going to retire the number of a player with a Yankee name, it’ll be Curt Schilling’s son Gehrig.
