Papi

by David Ortiz

  I was fortunate to finish the season strong after another slow start. I was still getting it done, at 39, with 37 doubles and 37 home runs. Just before my 40th birthday, I got a surprise phone call. It was Dave Dombrowski. He was very respectful, and he wanted to know my opinion about signing a player I’d clashed with in the past—David Price.

  Price had complained about me watching my home run in a playoff game. The next year he’d hit me, on purpose, to retaliate. But he was a great pitcher and I wanted to win.

  “Don’t worry about me and David, we’ll be fine,” I told Dombrowski.

  Besides, I didn’t want to get in the way of a long-term signing for the franchise. Price or any other free agent was going to have anywhere from three to seven years with the Red Sox. I hadn’t announced it yet, but I was pretty sure that my next season was going to be my last one.

  19

  The End and a New Beginning

  It was a gray Monday morning, April 11, 2016, and I had been awake for a while. Soon I would be in the car, for my 25-minute commute to work. I had been doing some version of this in the big leagues, getting ready for the home opener, since I was 21 years old. Now, at 40, I was preparing for the final season of my career.

  Other than the film crew set up in my driveway, there didn’t appear to be anything unusual about the day. My family was holding on to a secret that would have me in tears in a few hours, but I was too focused on the game ahead to figure out the plans my wife and children had made with the Red Sox to commemorate my last home opener.

  As I made the familiar drive, from suburban back roads to the Massachusetts Turnpike, from the Pike to Fenway, I saw the people who had inspired me for each of the last 14 seasons in Boston. A few blocks away from the park, I could already see hundreds of fans in their Red Sox jerseys and hats, anticipating the opener. I was going to miss this atmosphere, which I truly believe helped shape me as a player and as a person.

  I had carried this baseball culture, and this organization, in my blood. It was why I wanted to do everything possible to win ball games. My family had watched me through the years, so they knew about the sacrifices. They understood how much sleep I had lost, how many grade school concerts I had missed, how many practices and lessons I hadn’t driven to or even attended. The specialists and some of my teammates knew what I’d done privately. They realized that I’d played in pain, physical and emotional. I’d played as I went through stressful situations and family issues. I had never brought it to the field. I had left it in the Fenway parking lot, at the corner of Yawkey and Van Ness. The show had always gone on.

  It wasn’t going to be like that much longer. I’d already been warned by Pedro Martínez about what he felt was the biggest adjustment you have to make in retirement. He said it would be the lack of a routine. We had lived with tight schedules since we were teenagers in the minors, always needing to be in a certain place at a certain time. When baseball goes away, a player is suddenly an ex-player with an open schedule. And when the kids are in school, there’s the quiet of an empty house. Pedro said it might be uncomfortable at first. He said he missed the field, the competition, and the challenges.

  I didn’t know what it would be for me, but I knew I wouldn’t figure it out for a while. With one more year to play, I wanted to make this one of the best I had ever had.

  If the home opener was any indication of what the season would be, I wasn’t going to be able to put my head down and think solely of the game. There was going to be a lot of nostalgia from other teams, and even my own. It started a few minutes before the game, and I should have seen it coming. Before I left the house, Tiffany mentioned that the team hadn’t planned anything special for my final opener. Then she smiled. I should have known.

  As I stood on the field, broadcaster Joe Castiglione introduced the National Anthem singer. He said she had been just two years old when she moved from Minnesota to Boston, due to her father’s job. It didn’t occur to me, immediately, that he was talking about my 15-year-old daughter Alex. My hat was already off when I saw her, and it was a good thing because I needed something to cover my face as I cried.

  She sang the anthem beautifully, which was not a surprise. She’s a great singer, and she’d been practicing for her opening day assignment for weeks. We’d come a long way since our first home opener in Boston in 2003. I didn’t think then that one day I’d be given a special tribute by the Red Sox, one that would include Bill Russell, Jason Varitek, Ty Law, Pedro, Bobby Orr, Tim Wakefield . . . and the singing of my daughter. I had known back in ’03 that I could play, but I hadn’t guessed that I would be able to retire on my own terms and be considered the greatest designated hitter of all time. When Alex finished, I composed myself long enough to tell her how much love and pride I had for her.

  I had trained hard and well for this last year, so no matter how many obligations and requests I got, I knew the season wasn’t just about that. There would be signings, interviews, and commercials. I wasn’t going to complain about any of it, because when Alex was that two-year-old girl running around in Pedro’s basement, none of those opportunities were available to us. They became a reality because of where we lived, how I performed, and how much the team won. I was determined to give the people of Boston a winning performance one more time.

  That April day I knew early that, individually and collectively, we were on to something. I thought our roster was one of the most talented and athletic I’d seen in years. I loved the energy and abilities of young players like Mookie Betts, Xander Bogaerts, and Jackie Bradley Jr. They always asked questions about the back-and-forth adjustments of hitters and pitchers, so I’d begun doing for them what Pedro and Manny had done for me. There was a psychology to each at-bat, a game plan, and as a hitter you couldn’t expect to be successful going to the plate with an empty head.

  For example, I wanted the young players to see the repeating patterns in how most pitchers dealt with me. I could have taught a whole class on it based just on the way Ubaldo Jiménez pitched to me two days after the opener. Going into the game, my guess was that Ubaldo was going to pitch away and try to force me to get myself out. So I had to go to the plate mindful of that possibility: Be patient. He’s just trying to get you to chase. I’ve gotten myself out against him because I swung at bad pitches.

  Sure enough, I walked in my first at-bat. I walked in my second at-bat. In my third at-bat, he threw a fastball for a ball and then a splitter for a strike. Now I’m sitting on bullshit. Got it: there was a breaking ball to the back of my leg. Finally, I swung and grounded out to first. It was an out, but I knew what he wanted to do. And once you know what a pitcher wants to do, the chances of success go way up.

  For my walk in the third inning, Ubaldo had thrown a slider on a 3–0 count. It was his go-fuck-yourself pitch. Nobody in the league is hitting a 3–0 slider. It was like an intentional walk. As I told my young teammates, it’s a hard game that gets a little easier when you have a good idea of the strike zone and how pitchers think. That 3–0 slider? You just can’t swing at that. You could bring a random fan out of the stands and he wouldn’t swing at that either.

  I wanted them to see the effect of a scouting report. It’s why everybody pitched me the same way. Everybody. The first pitch was going to be on the outside part of the plate. They never tried to sneak one by me, and they never tried to throw me in. When they came into me, it was a mistake. They didn’t try to challenge me. The day after the opener, Mike Wright tried to do that, and I hit that shit into the bullpen. That was my strength, and pitchers knew it. An inside fastball was mine, not theirs. It didn’t matter how hard they threw. That’s what came naturally to me. That was my strength.

  When I took batting practice in the cage, I’d practice hitting the ball to the opposite field. I’m a pure pull hitter, so I worked on hitting the ball off the Green Monster because I knew most pitchers were trying to operate on the outside and those were the most likely pitches I’d get. If my teammates saw me hitting a bunch of dou
bles off the Monster, they might be like, Man. This guy is locked in. But it wasn’t really that. I explained to them that I didn’t worry about both sides of the plate. If there was one player in the league who didn’t have to worry about both sides of the plate, it was me.

  I knew the young players would figure it out and get into a routine that worked for them. Their talent is exceptional. I’m amazed by Betts. He asks a ton of questions and walks around, unassuming, with a smile on his face. Then he plays the game and he’s a beast. He has everything: smarts, speed, power, character. And he was doing all of that at 23. I didn’t figure out half of the stuff I know until I was 27 or 28.

  That’s something I noticed about our young players as well as players on other teams. They’re figuring things out faster than my generation did. Mike Trout was an incredible hitter in his early twenties. Same for Bryce Harper. It’s not normal for players to be MVPs that early in their careers. It was fun to watch them go to the plate with confidence because it reminded me of what I used to be able to do. I was still a good player at 40, and I knew it. But at 30, I’d felt that I could do anything I wanted. Look at it this way. One time Russell Martin asked me during the 2016 season, “Papi, why are you so good?” I told him, “Bruh, I used to be better than this.” He looked at me like that was impossible. But it was true. I’ll bet you a guy like Albert Pujols, who’s going to the Hall of Fame, knows what I’m talking about. You go from untouchable greatness to pretty good. You feel the drop-off. It happens to everybody, no matter how good you are.

  Our season was developing exactly how I wanted. I knew there would be final-season tributes and interviews along the way. I knew that some of the sponsors I worked with, from JetBlue to Xfinity to Dunkin’ Donuts, wanted to do commercials during the year. My hope had been to have those things happen on the perimeter while the focus, mine and everyone else’s, remained on the field.

  We were doing exactly that at the end of May. After a win in Baltimore, we were 32–20 and in first place in the division. We were murdering pitching. Mookie, who was just starting to warm up, had a three-homer game against the Orioles. He was our leadoff man, but I looked at the way he handled the bat, quick wrists and a powerful swing, and I didn’t think he would be out of place in the middle of the order. I was hitting .335 with a slugging percentage of .716. Xander and Jackie were well over .300, at .350 and .331.

  I wasn’t surprised by our hitting, or even our pitching, since we had David Price and Rick Porcello at the top of the rotation. The bigger surprise was Price. He was the man. I didn’t know him that well before we had our problems on the field. It had been a respectful relationship, but not a deep one. After he’d hit me with a pitch in 2014, neither one of us was trying to be buddies. But having the chance to see Price every day changed my perspective. I can tell you that he’s one of the best teammates I’ve ever had. He’s the kind of person you want to be around. He goes above and beyond to make his teammates feel comfortable, whether it’s giving us shoes—as he did multiple times during the season—or bringing in a caterer. Or just having a connection with everyone, making sure we’re all right.

  In his first 10 to 12 starts, he wasn’t shutting hitters down the way he usually did, but I liked what I heard. Or what I didn’t hear. He didn’t make excuses, and he never ran away from his problems. Once I saw that was the way he handled himself, no matter what his performance was, I knew he would be one of the free agents who makes it in Boston.

  At every stop of the season, at least three or four times a day, someone would ask, “Are you sure you want to retire?” I’d smile at the question and be respectful, but the answer was always the same. Yes, I was 100 percent sure. Before making my decision, I’d talked to numerous people. One of them, of course, was my father. He didn’t even need to hear my explanation. He said he understood.

  I was so thankful to be in the position to retire at 40 rather than, say, 65, and my father was a big reason that was possible. As hard as I worked at baseball, I never came close to working as hard as my parents. My dad was at work six days a week. He didn’t see me play a lot of my games when I was growing up because he was working, trying to make sure we had what we needed. He was a great father and a no-nonsense one as well. I did my work and stayed out of trouble because I respected him so much and didn’t want to disappoint him. He was the one who kept pushing me toward baseball and telling me that I had a gift for the game. To be able to retire as a good player, and have my father alive to see his dream realized, was meaningful to me.

  I’d also talked with John Henry before making the decision. He asked me if I was sure and I assured him that I was. His response was that the organization would have my back the entire way. I thought of all the things I’d been through and how upset and embarrassed I’d been when the Twins released me. Then I thought about what it meant that I had landed in a historic franchise, in a city with my same spirit, playing for an owner who wanted to win. Just because you have the money to own a baseball team doesn’t mean you’re guaranteed to love the game. Mr. Henry loves the game, and I could feel how much he appreciated me as a player. That meant a lot to me. I did not always agree with the Red Sox, and we had our conflicts over money, but that was business. Always has been and always will be. As I went through the season, I made myself pause every now and then and just think about how truly fortunate I had been.

  I played for 20 seasons. Do you realize how many bad things could have happened over 20 years? I remember one year we had an ordeal in Cleveland. The airplane went damn near sideways. We were supposed to touch down in Cleveland’s international airport, but we wound up going back up and making plans for landing at a private airport. We were freaking out.

  Guys were legitimately scared. I was sitting next to one of our relievers at the time, Bobby Jenks. He turned to me with total fear and sincerity and said, “Papi, don’t worry. God will take care of our families.”

  That’s how bad it was.

  Let’s be real and honest. There are so many challenges and temptations that can affect your personal life when you have spent 20 years in the big leagues. You don’t know who you can trust. We spend a lot of time on the road by ourselves. You have to be careful about the people you allow into your life and get clear about their intentions and expectations. You never know who can play a trick on you. It happens with a lot of players. There are beautiful women in every city, and many opportunities to meet up with them. Sometimes it’s harmless. Sometimes it’s a case of someone seeking attention, or more. Even innocent situations can become tricky.

  I remember once being driven out of Fenway after a game, and a crowd had gathered around my car as we tried turning onto Yawkey Way. I signed several autographs, but then many fans began to overwhelm the car. I stopped signing and drove away. Later, I heard that a fan wanted to sue because apparently part of one of the wheels hit his foot. After that, I came up with a new rule: never sign autographs in the car. Look, it’s a challenge, man. Being a famous athlete has its price. You put up with a lot of shit that people don’t see or understand. Being in a position to come out of those 20 years with my reputation intact has been a blessing.

  I was more than happy to share my wisdom with young players on our team, or any other team. I didn’t want to see anyone get caught up in something avoidable. One thing I learned early on is that some people out there want to misinterpret the message. So one of my rules was to never take a picture with someone holding a drink, unless it was obvious that it was in a place where many people were drinking. Another thing I wouldn’t do was take a picture on an elevator or in a hotel room. The world can be twisted at times, and some people will try to say or do anything for some money.

  As I got ready for my 10th and final All-Star Game, in San Diego, I reflected on how fortunate I was to be honored there. No one thought that would be the case in 2009. They expected me to be out of the game, not hitting .332 with 22 home runs. In 2009, when the New York Times story accusing me of doping came out, I had been to
five All-Star Games, and the thought was that I wouldn’t be going to any more. I was now at my fifth one since being accused. I was still hitting. Still relevant. But that wasn’t even the biggest victory for me. It was talking to the commissioner, Rob Manfred, and hearing him say that the list I was on in 2003 was not proof of any performance-enhancing drug violation. That supported what I’d been saying for years! It was gratifying to hear that from him after I’d experienced years of blatant and subtle attacks on my legitimacy.

  It had reached an all-time level of silliness in 2014, when I was approaching 500 career home runs. I would get drug-tested for a night game, then again for the day game the next day. They would test me on the road, and again four days later at home. With random testing, being tested four or five times in a month was unheard of. The typical player might be tested two or three times in a season. Not me. I was being tested at an extraordinary rate because that old story had put doubt and confusion in everyone’s heads. I used to get mad at every joker saying something in print, on TV, talk radio, or Twitter, or at the park. But as my career started coming to an end, I decided to view the tests as a challenge. As motivation. I wanted as many tests as possible so there would be no excuses later. It got to the point where I’d see the drug-testing guy coming in and say to him, “I’m ready. Let’s go.”