David Ortiz! David Ortiz! David Ortiz!
Big Papi gets elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility
After hours of dithering by Major League Baseball, MLB Network, and the Hall of Fame itself, finally the announcement came yesterday around 6:15pm. David Ortiz had been elected to the Hall of Fame by the Baseball Writers Association of America with 77.9 percent of the vote. This news, joyous as it was, only confirmed what most of us knew when we woke up yesterday, two months ago, two years ago, and ten years ago: David Ortiz is a Hall of Famer.
Now it’s just more official.
There have been greater hitters in baseball history, but never has there been a baseball player who made a bigger impact on his team and in the city he played in.
Ortiz began his career in Boston in a part-time capacity, sharing playing time with the likes of Kevin Millar and Shea Hillenbrand, among others. An afterthought at the beginning, it took Ortiz only until the end of the season to become a franchise cornerstone. But that was just the warmup. After his second season in Boston, Ortiz had transformed himself into a franchise all time great and the city into the home of a World Series winner.
I could go on and on here, and maybe it would be fun to do so, but I suspect you know the particulars of Ortiz’s career in Boston already. Instead of finishing off his resume, I’ll pass on some fun Ortiz facts.
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Ortiz facts!
He holds the record for highest career batting average in the World Series with a minimum of 35 plate appearances. Ortiz hit a towering .455 in the World Series over 59 PAs.
Ortiz has the second highest batting average of any player in any single World Series. His .688 average in the 2013 Fall Classic is only behind Billy Hatcher of the 1990 Reds. Hatcher hit .750 in that World Series, though he did it in 15 PAs, 10 less than Ortiz in ‘13.
Papi is second all time in World Series career slugging percentage, behind only George Springer (minimum of 50 PAs).
Ortiz has the highest career on-base percentage, .576, of any player in World Series history with at least 50 PAs.
He is 17th all time in home runs with 541, ahead of Mickey Mantle, Jimmie Foxx, and Willie McCovey.
He is 12th all time in doubles with 632, ahead of Hank Aaron, Paul Molitor, and Barry Bonds.
All those numbers are silly. Finishing ahead of Mickey Mantle in homers and Barry Bonds in doubles? Silliness. What doesn’t show up in the stats though is the way Ortiz lifted a city like he lifted the ball over the Monster. When Boston was struggling in the wake of the Marathon bombings, Ortiz stood up, spoke from his heart, and helped it heal.
There are really just two potential issues with Ortiz’s candidacy. First, his suspected use of steroids and second, the fact that he spent the vast majority of his career at DH. First, let’s address the steroids.
I won’t attempt to change anyone’s mind about whether or not a steroid user should or shouldn’t be disqualified from entering the Hall. Instead, I’ll just point out ever so gently that Ortiz never failed a test for any kind of substance in his 14 years in Boston. While his name was circulated as a potential positive from the pre-tests that were implemented before MLB instituted testing, the commissioner of baseball, Rob Manfred, has said those specific tests were detecting all sorts of things and a positive result did not mean any given player was using steroids.
I’m not going to hold up Rob Manfred as a paragon of truth, but it’s worth pointing out that these were anonymous tests and there are real questions about how legitimate the list of leaked names are and what those names were actually accused of doing. Beyond that, Ortiz was tested over and over and over in the ensuing decade plus and never once failed a test for steroids or any other drug, performance-enhancing or otherwise.
As for the DH thing, yup. He was a DH. DH is a position in baseball, just as reliever is a position in baseball. The best of those players are eligible for the Hall, just as Ortiz is. Not much more to say about it, I’m afraid.
If you look at Ortiz’s career WAR you might be slightly underwhelmed when comparing that to his contemporaries. It’s worth pointing out that WAR penalizes players who DH, as in there’s an actual subtraction of value for simply playing the position. That makes sense and I’m not saying it’s wrong to do it that way. People much smarter than me can debate that, but the fact that Ortiz put up as much value as he did despite not playing defense is itself impressive. Would he have been a better player if he could’ve also played a gold glove shortstop? Sure, but that’s not what Ortiz was good at. He was a hitter and he was great at it.
If I’m honest, I haven’t been invested in the Hall of Fame debate for the past few years. The never-ending argument over steroids and morality has grown profoundly tiresome and I’ve pulled back from it over time without really even meaning to do so. But as Hall announcement time got closer yesterday I found myself giddy and not a little bit nervous. Why? Ortiz isn’t just some old player. He represents the power of perseverance, the will to never give up in the face of adversity, whether that’s the Twins trying to rewire his entire offensive philosophy, or the Yankees laughing at him and the rest of the Red Sox while pummeling them 19-8 to take an insurmountable three-games-to-none lead in the 2004 ALCS. Those are valuable and important traits to admire in the man, but if we’re being completely honest here, they’re not in short supply in players both in and outside the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Ortiz though is more than that. He represents the Red Sox rebirth as a franchise. He represents the strength of the City of Boston itself. More than once Ortiz almost physically shoved the Red Sox beyond where they surely would’ve fallen short had he not been there. There were the homers to beat the Yankees, the speech in the dugout during Game Four of the 2013 World Series, and countless other instances. I’m sure you have your own favorite. And of course there will always be the, “This is our fucking city” speech.
The moment that springs to mind most quickly though when I think of the man is his grand slam against the Tigers in the 2013 ALCS. It was perfectly captured by Dave O’Brien on the radio at the time. Here it is. Listen.
That’s why when word came that Ortiz had been elected to the Hall, I tweeted this.
It was a privilege to watch him play baseball and for all he did on the field and off it, he deserves enshrinement into a museum dedicated to preserving the legacy he built over 14 years with the Red Sox.
While it’s an honor for Ortiz, it’s also an honor for the Hall, because, well, could you really tell the story of baseball without Big Papi? No fucking way.