The David Ortiz Problem (He Wears His Sunglasses At Night)

http://bit.ly/1BT5a

The Sporting News is reporting that the Red Sox may be interested in trading for Brewers OF Corey Hart. (No, not THAT Corey Hart.) David Ortiz, who is hitting like Roxie Hart at present (.185, 1 HR, 18 RBI), passed "struggling" several weeks ago. In fact, his average would have to come up about 50 points for him to make it to "struggling".

This creates a dilemma, which is how, if you are a close reader here, you know it is spelled. I think. Yes, it is. I dont know where dilemna came from, but I have been spelling it that way for a long time.

But I digress.

David Ortiz is, of course, literally a Red Sox legend. His heroics in 2004 give him a permanent place in the team's canon-back to back walk off hits to fell the mighty Yankee machine in the 2004 playoffs and claw back from the brink of oblivion alone make him a hero.

But it's 2009, the calendars tell me. And the 2009 Red Sox are interested solely in winning games during 2009, and David Ortiz is not helping them do so at the present time.

There are steroid whispers, of course, as there always are. There is no evidence at the present time. He doesn't look dramatically different than did 10 years ago-he mostly just looks fatter. He has had a dramatic drop off in production in 2008 and a cliff dive-sized drop in 2009. He has also had a horrible wrist injury that appears to be still bothering him.

You really can't do forensic statistics. Look at Jason Varitek, who went from "acceptable for a catcher with good defense" in 2007 to "Children, look away" in 2008, right back to "acceptable" so far in 2009. That wasn't steroids.

So I am forced to conclude I don't know if he used, and you don't know either.

In summary, it is nauseating to think of Ortiz on the bench or (shudder) playing for another team. But it is also nauseating to watch him continue to flail away hopelessly.

Sigh.

I'm glad I'm not Terry Francona.