Joe DiMaggio or Ted Williams?

By Paul Semendinger

March 25, 2025

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NOTE - This article was written for the IBWAA and was published in their newsletter on March 22, 2025

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The other day, I was having a spirited discussion with a reader on my Yankees site (Start Spreading the News).

We were trying to determine what defines a great player.

In short, the reader claimed that Juan Soto (now a former Yankee) was not a great player in 2024. I disagreed. Juan Soto is, as I see it, a great player. And he was a great player in 2024. Absolutely.

I shared that Juan Soto put up 7.9 WAR in 2024. That was 6th best in the MLB last year. That seems to indicate a certain level of greatness.

A 7.9 WAR is a very impressive total. I compared that total to some players, often considered Yankees greats. Across his entire career, Derek Jeter exceeded 7.9 WAR exactly one time, and just barely (8.0 in 1999). Of note, Don Mattingly, Yogi Berra, Roger Maris, and Paul O'Neill, among many others, never had a 7.9 WAR season. In addition, Reggie Jackson and Dave Winfield exceeded 7.9 WAR in a season only once each across their entire careers.

The argument against Soto is that he is a one-dimensional player. Soto, it was said, is a great hitter, but he's not great with any other skill. The reader's point was that a player cannot be considered great if he is not an all-around great player. A great hitter alone, it was argued, is not a great player. In order to be great, a player must also be an excellent fielder, runner, and such. It's an interesting take and one I don't necessarily agree with.

Oftentimes, when baseball fans begin to discuss and debate all-around greatness compared to just one area of greatness, two players, rivals throughout most of their careers, are brought up: Ted Williams (a great hitter who was, at best, indifferent as a fielder) and Joe DiMaggio (who exemplified all-around greatness).

One of the longest-running debates in baseball centers on which of those two was actually the better player, DiMaggio or Williams.

Of course, a case can be made for both, but I decided to compare them again.

Joe DiMaggio played from 1936 through 1951, minus the seasons where he had military duty.

Ted Williams' career lasted from 1939 through 1960, again minus his military duty.

Since he had the longer career, Williams exceeds DiMaggio in virtually every offensive counting stat and it's not even close. Williams also betters DiMaggio in batting average (.344 to .325), on-base percentage (.482 to .398), and slugging percentage (.634 to .579). When looking at these numbers, it is difficult (if not impossible) to argue that DiMaggio was the better player. Ted Williams had the more impressive career, or so it seems.

Joe DiMaggio, of course has a few arguments in his favor. Even with a shorter career, he won more MVP awards. DiMaggio was also the greatest player on a team that continually won the pennant, and most often the World Series.

DiMaggio appeared in 10 World Series, Williams, just one. DiMaggio's team won 9 World Series, Williams was never on a World Series winner. It would be a challenge to argue against DiMaggio's record of success.

And, maybe, the debate can never be truly reconciled.

But I decided to give it a try by looking only at the seasons their careers over-lapped (1939 to 1951) to see if there is a way to determine which of the two players was better in that period.

Over that span, Williams was, again, by far, the more dominant hitter. To use traditional counting stats, he hit .347/323/1261 to DiMaggio's .322/254/1105. Williams also scored more runs and hit more doubles. He also played in more games in that span than DiMaggio (1,421 to 1,302). Williams exceeds DiMaggio in OBP (.484 to .404) and SLG (.633 to .567). In that period, Ted Williams' OPS+ was 190 compared to DiMaggio's 159. Looking at those numbers, I find it challenging to find a way to argue for DiMaggio over Williams. Again, they were both great, but Williams had the vastly superior counting stats.

I decided to then compare MVP votes over that same period. I wondered which of the two players was considered, by the writers of the time, more "valuable" overall from 1939 to 1951, and what I found was somewhat shocking. I thought this would be an area where DiMaggio greatly exceeded Williams, but that was not the case. From 1939 to 1951, Joe DiMaggio finished in the top-ten in MVP votes seven times. Ted Williams did as well. In that regard they were equal. DiMaggio won his three MVPs in that period, slightly more than Williams' two awards, but then I found something surprising. DiMaggio was a top-three vote getter five times, Williams finished that high six times. Even in this, Williams exceeded the great DiMaggio.

(NOTE - I thought of this later, so this was not in the original article, but the fact that Ted Williams had more top-three MVP vote seasons than DiMaggio is somewhat shocking. Baseball history is replete with stories of Williams' difficulties with the press. Many historians have claimed that Williams would have won more MVPs if not for the fact that he was left off some writers' ballots. At the same time, DiMaggio was revered. Les Brown would write a song about him. His 56 game hitting streak was the biggest story of the day. DiMaggio was so much bigger than life that in 1952, his name would appear in Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea. Even with much against him, Williams was seen as a top three contender for the MVP in more seasons that Joe DiMaggio. That speaks, loudly, to Williams' greatness.)

I know it's a flawed statistic, but until we get a better one, a researcher must look to Wins Above Replacement (WAR) to at least see what those numbers can tell us. WAR is supposed to account for factors beyond simply hitting stats. WAR also isn't kind to DiMaggio in this contest against Ted Williams - and it's not even close. From 1939 to 1951, Ted Williams accumulated 82.5 WAR. Joe D. accumulated 60.2. That difference is vast.

All of this seems to indicate that Ted Williams was, in fact, the better player. DiMaggio was the world champion, but statistically, I cannot find a way to argue that he was a better player than Teddy Ballgame. They were both great, but Ted Williams was greater.

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Paul Semendinger, Ed.D., is a retired school principal who is gearing up for the new baseball season where he still pitches in an over-35 wood bat baseball league. Paul still believes the Yankees should give him a look. The Yankees need a starting pitcher (or two) and Paul can give them lots of innings.