David Ortiz was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in January. Ortiz is the all-time DH leader in HR and RBI. He played 20 seasons in the majors and hit .286/.380/.552 with 541 home runs and 1768 RBI in his career. Additionally, he’s a 10-time All-Star. Ortiz won the World Series Champions with the Red Sox three times. He definitely had a legendary career. And, I’m just wondering who’s the best DH after David Ortiz retired.
David Ortiz retired in 2016. So, I went to check on the great FanGraphs website and found something interesting since 2017.
J.D. Martinez is one of the most dangerous hitters in the majors now. His batting average is .298 since 2017. He joined the Red Sox in 2018 and over the last 4 seasons, he slashed .297/.369/.548 with 114 home runs and 361 RBI.
David Ortiz retired in 2016 and he was 40. However, Nelson Cruz is already 41 years old and he still wants to play. Cruz has played 17 seasons in the majors and so far in his career, he has 449 home runs and collects 1238 RBI. Since 2017, Cruz has a batting average of .281 and he was hitting .265/.334/.497 last season.
In addition, David Ortiz finished the 2016 season with 127 RBI, tying 2nd most in the majors. At age 40, that’s definitely not easy, but David Ortiz made it. Back in 2016, Albert Pujols had 119 RBI in the Angels uniform. From 2017 to 2021, Pujols already collected 333 RBI. However, Pujols already turned 42 and he has never collected 100+ RBI in a single season since 2017. In the meantime, J.D. Martinez and Nelson Cruz each had 400+ RBI from 2017 to 2021.
In 2016, David Ortiz crushed 38 home runs in his final season in the majors. We have seen more home runs in today’s baseball games, but it’s never easy to hit 30+ home runs in a single season. Since 2017, Nelson Cruz has blasted 165 home runs and he had 32 homers in 2021. Furthermore, J.D. Martinez had 159 home runs from 2017 to 2021. Martinez crushed 28 home runs last year. By far, Martinez, who is 34 years old now, has 266 home runs in his career. Meanwhile, Giancarlo Stanton, who turned 32 last November, crushed 139 home runs from 2017 to 2021. Stanton has played in the majors for 12 seasons and he has had 347 HRs so far in his career. Additionally, Khris Davis and Edwin Encarnacion each had 100+ home runs from 2017 to 2021.
After David Ortiz retired in 2016, it seems that J.D. Martinez and Nelson Cruz are quite productive. Moreover, Giancarlo Stanton joined the Yankees in 2018 and he’s surely a very dangerous hitter when he’s healthy. And, Nelson Cruz has shown that he can still hit even though he’s over 40.
Well, we still don’t know when the MLB owners and the MLBPA will reach a new Collective Bargaining Agreement. Nonetheless, it seems that these two parties will agree to the universal DH rule. David Ortiz spent his entire career with the teams in the American League. In the future, we shall see great full-time designated hitters in the National League. Nevertheless, it’s not that easy to see another full-time DH become a Hall of Famer soon.
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