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Late in the 1934 season, he announced that he would not play on [[Rosh Hashanah]], the Jewish New Year, or the Day of Atonement, [[Yom Kippur]]. Fans grumbled, "Rosh Hashanah comes every year but the Tigers haven't won the pennant since [[1909 in baseball|1909]]." Greenberg did considerable soul-searching, and discussed the matter with his [[rabbi]]; finally he relented and agreed to play on Rosh Hashanah, but stuck with his decision not to play on Yom Kippur. Dramatically, Greenberg hit two home runs in a pennant-clinching 2-1 Tigers victory. The next day's [[Detroit Free Press]] ran the Hebrew lettering for "Happy New Year" across its front page.<ref>http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:xnCPhT6vVsYJ:www.anzasa.arts.usyd.edu.au/a.j.a.s/Articles/2_04/Dab.pdf+%22hank+greenberg%22+%2B+%22jimmy+dykes%22&cd=24&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us</ref> Columnist and poet [[Edgar A. Guest]] expressed the general opinion in a poem titled "Speaking of Greenberg," in which he used the Irish (and thus Catholic) names Murphy and Mulroney. The poem ends with the lines "''We shall miss him on the infield and shall miss him at the bat / But he's true to his religion--and I honor him for that.''" The complete text of the poem is at the end of Greenberg's biography page at the website of the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.
In [[1935 in baseball|1935]] Greenberg led the league in RBIs (170) and total bases (389), tied [[Jimmy Foxx|Foxx]] for the AL title in home runs (36), was 2nd in the league in doubles (46), slugging percentage (.628), was 3rd in the league triples (16), and in runs scored (121). He also led the Tigers to their first World Series title. (However, he broke his wrist in the second game.) He was voted the [[American League]]'s [[Most Valuable Player]]. He set a record (still standing) of 103 RBIs at the All-Star break - but was not selected to the AL All-Star Game roster.[http://espn.go.com/classic/biography/s/greenberg_hank.html]
In [[1937 in baseball|1937]] Greenberg was voted to the [[All-Star]] Team. On September 19, 1937, he hit the first-ever homer into the center field [[bleachers]] at Yankee Stadium. He led the AL by driving in 183 runs (3rd all-time, behind [[Hack Wilson]] in [[1930 in baseball|1930]] and [[Lou Gehrig]] in [[1931 in baseball|1931]]), while batting .337 with 200 hits. He was 2nd in the league in home runs (40), doubles (49), total bases (397), slugging percentage (.668), and walks (102). Still, Greenberg came in only 3rd in the vote for MVP.
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