Wearing the loudest technicolor shirt after a long day — where time passed so excruciatingly that the whole afternoon felt like the first two minutes back on an exercise bike after a long break — David Ortiz told the virtually assembled members of the Baseball Writers Association of America: “To me, that guy is a Hall of Famer.”
He was talking about Barry Bonds, home run king and perhaps the most impressive all-around offensive player in the sport’s history.
Unfortunately for Bonds, to 34% of the voting members of the BBWAA, he is not.
Ortiz had the opportunity to opine on Bonds’ greatness — “this is a guy who played the game to a whole totally different level” — because the venerable, affable face of the Boston Red Sox dynasty known as Big Papi had just been elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year on the ballot.