"They've been pitching me crazy, man. When I come to the plate with a man on second and first base is open, nothing."
It doesn't even matter, Ortiz said, that Manny Ramírez is waiting on deck.
"Manny bats behind me all the time, but they don't care," he said. "Believe me, at one point they're going to have to. Manny will do way better than he has so far at some point."
In the meantime, Ortiz takes his hits. Two singles and a walk off Rockies starter Aaron Cook and a double last night off Jeremy Affeldt, the former Kansas City Royals lefthander who had held Ortiz hitless in 12 at-bats until Ortiz got him last night. Ortiz is batting .403 in his last 17 games and has reached base safely in 29 straight games, 34 of 35.
"David took a beautiful swing," manager Terry Francona said. "It was a little weird. Coming off the bat, you couldn't tell if the right fielder had a bead on it or not."
The outfielder, Brad Hawpe, had about as much chance of catching Ortiz's ball as the Rockies had of hitting Tim Wakefield, who came away with a win after Colorado had tied the score in the top of the eighth. For the Rockies, making only their second trip to Fenway Park in a decade of interleague play, Wakefield's knuckleball was truly a foreign object. Only Todd Helton had ever stepped in against Wakefield, and that was for one at-bat.
"But I don't care how many times someone has seen him, Wakefield was very good tonight," said Francona of the 40-year-old knuckleballer, who took a 1-0 lead into the eighth and had limited the Rockies to two hits and a walk until Hawpe doubled and scored on Yorvit Torrealba's two-out single to center.
Jonathan Papelbon finished off the Rockies in the ninth, striking out two and looking scary while doing so.
"He came in throwing BBs," said Dustin Pedroia, the rookie second baseman who in his first game as Sox leadoff man punched a single through the left side to start the winning rally.
