He Also Could Have Been Known as Pride of Yankees

The number of people who watched him work in his prime has declined to a privileged few, but almost all of them would tell you that baseball’s greatest catcher was the New York Yankees’ Bill Dickey.

Dickey, who died six years ago today, was the catcher on some of the Yankees’ greatest teams, first as a 21-year-old rookie in 1928. He played six full seasons with Babe Ruth, then was well into the Yankees’ Joe DiMaggio era when he retired in 1946, after 17 seasons. He missed two years to service in World War II.

More than 50 years after his last season, Dickey is still in the record book. He’s one of five catchers with 100 or more games caught in a season with no passed balls.

Dickey is among four catchers to catch 100 or more games in 13 consecutive seasons. The record-holder is Bob Boone, with 15.

Dickey, 6 feet 2 and 200 pounds, was known as a clutch hitter. He batted .313 for his career, with 202 home runs. He was named to 11 All-Star teams.

He hit five home runs in eight World Series. His ninth-inning single won Game 1 of the 1939 World Series. His two-run homer was the difference in Game 5 in 1943, giving the Series to the Yankees.

Dickey retired at roughly the time the Yankees brought up a young catching prospect named Yogi Berra. Dickey was called back to teach him how to play the position.

He was the strong, silent type, who played his position with a certain amount of tension.

In 1932, he took exception to the way a baserunner had slid on a play at the plate. He punched the runner, flattening him and breaking his jaw. He was fined and suspended, but the message had been delivered. For years afterward, runners approached Dickey at the plate with great caution.

In the 1942 film about Lou Gehrig, “Pride of the Yankees,” Dickey played himself.

He was 86 when he died in a nursing home in Little Rock, Ark.

Also on this date: In 1920, major league owners elected Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis their commissioner and gave him a seven-year contract at $50,000 a year. . . . In 1964, former major league pitcher and manager Fred Hutchinson died of cancer at 45.