Big Papi – He’s Baaaaaaaaaack!

On a warm beautiful night in Fenway Park, Big Papi blasted a 1-0 hanging breaking ball well into the right field seats, giving the Red Sox a 3-2 win and evoking memories of years’ past. And like most of his now 10 career walkoff home runs, this one was extremely important, giving the Sox a 2.5 game lead over Texas in the Wild Card standings.

David Ortiz got off to a slow start this year – okay a historically bad slow start. Ortiz was hitting just .185 with 1 HR and 18 RBI’s. He didn’t hit his first home run till May 20th in Fenway Park – a span of 149 at bats . But those days in April and May when Ortiz couldn’t catch up to the high fastball or adjust to the breaking stuff, are long behind him. Big Papi has been playing at a near MVP caliber pace since June 1st.


Sine June 1st:

HR	Slugging %	RBI
David Ortiz 21	Kendry Morales .612	Bobby Abreu 63
Russell Branyan 20	Miguel Cabrera .578	David Ortiz 59
Carlos Pena 20	Adam Lind .575	Kendry Morales 55
Kendry Morales 19	David Ortiz .566	Russell Branyan 53
Aaron Hill 18	Hideki Matsui .563	Juan Rivera 53

Ortiz’s batting line since June 1st is .257 avg, .344 OBP, .566 slug %, with 21 home runs, 35 extra base hits in 70 games. It’s not quite the production of Big Papi circa 2003-2007, but it still ranks him as one of the best sluggers in the American League. Ortiz has been absolutely scintillating lately, with 7 home runs in his last 11 games, batting .333 and slugging .927 in those games.

The walkoff home run gives Papi his 9th with the Red Sox (breaking a tie he shared with Jimmie Foxx) and 10th overall, just two behind Babe Ruth (and 5 others) for the all time record.

The Red Sox are seeking their 3rd World Series title in the last 6 years. If they want to get to October and be a force in the playoffs, they’ll need the resurgent David Ortiz. And now that they have him back, no one looks forward to facing this team in the postseason.