The song remains the same

Major League Baseball has never had a designated hitter named MVP of the regular season, nor have they ever inducted a career DH into the hall of fame...But change is coming in the form of Big Papi David Ortiz. Down two in the bottom of the 9th, with two on and one out, Papi took a 2-0 fastball deep into the Fenway Park bleachers to deliver a 9-8 win after a disappointing day in which the Red Sox made no moves before the trade deadline expired.

From the Globe's Dan Shaughnessy: We have reached the point in hardball history where teams are going to have to start walking Ortiz even if if means loading the bases to pitch to the modern Jimmie Foxx (Manny Ramirez). This was Ortiz's third walkoff homer this year, his seventh regular-season walkoff homer with the Red Sox, and the eighth regular-season walkoff homer of his career. He has two postseason walkoff homers. He has 15 regular-season walkoff hits and five walkoff hits in the last 51 days. He has 37 homers and 105 RBIs after 104 games. He hit 14 homers in July with 35 RBIs. He is the American League MVP at this hour. He is a player you might want to think about intentionally walking even if the bases are loaded.

Despite the dramatics in the 9th, the night was a disappointment as a whole. David Wells made his 1st start since May, giving up 8 runs in 5 innings. Obviously Boomber is going to have to improve things if the Sox hope to keep their first place lead. No reports of knee problems after the game...

Another major problem was the twisted knee/ankle of catcher Jason Varitek. Tek suffered the injury while rounding 2nd and was taken out of the game. Even though UB is not a huge Tek fan, UB's not dumb enough to say the Sox are better off with Doug Mirabelli behind the plate...Maybe the biggest downer of the night was Wily Mo Pena falling a double short of the cycle...

All day on WEEI callers were comparing Papi's heroics to those of UB's all time favorite Red Sox Carl Yastrzemski in his triple crown year of 1967. That year Yaz was as clutch as anyone in the history of the Red Sox. The difference between Yaz and Ortiz this year has been that Yaz made the plays in the field and produced the big hits between innings 1-8. Papi often saves his Superman impression for the 9th. Which one was better? Well Yaz won the triple crown during a year in which pitching dominant, won the MVP and was the Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year in leading the Sox to the AL Pennant. On top of that he played a gold glove caliber left field...Papi, while on a tear, hasn't reached those numbers quite yet...