Used almost exclusively as a DH during his 14 seasons with the Red Sox, he was a ten-time All-Star and a seven-time Silver Slugger winner, and became regarded as one of the greatest designated hitters of all time.

Regarded as one of the greatest clutch hitters of all time,[2] he had 11 career walk-off home runs during the regular season and two during the 2004 postseason, the first of which clinched the AL Division Series.

On November 28, 1992, Ortiz was signed by the Seattle Mariners just 10 days after his 17th birthday, who listed him as "David Arias" due to not being familiar with Spanish naming customs.

[5] Also in Wisconsin, Ortiz met his future wife Tiffany; she led him to become a fan of the nearby Green Bay Packers NFL team, a devotion that would become lifelong.

Despite his strong year in the Mariners' system, on September 13, 1996, Ortiz was traded to the Minnesota Twins as the player to be named later to complete an earlier transaction for Dave Hollins.

Though he started with the High-A Fort Myers Miracle, he quickly progressed through Double-A (New Britain Rock Cats), to the Triple-A Salt Lake Buzz.

[4] In 1999, Ortiz figured to be a fixture in the lineup, but after a tough spring training which saw him bat only .137, he was sent down to the Triple-A Salt Lake Buzz as the sure-handed rookie Doug Mientkiewicz earned the first base job.

It was becoming apparent that manager Tom Kelly preferred veteran players or those who fit into his small-ball and good defense philosophy, something Ortiz would later be vocal about after his days with the Twins.

On September 7, he hit his first major league grand slam at Fenway Park against Boston Red Sox pitcher Ramón Martínez,[11] one of his childhood heroes from the Dominican Republic.

He finished the year with a disappointing .234 average, however, the 11 home runs he hit over the season's final two months (including his first multihomer game on September 5 against the Texas Rangers) offered a glimmer of hope for the future.

When the season started, all of them made the team, including Ortiz, with the new designated hitter/first baseman taking player number 34 in honor of his mentor and friend on the Twins, Kirby Puckett.

After expressing his frustration to the media, Pedro Martínez pulled his friend aside to defuse the situation, then asked manager Grady Little to ensure Ortiz always be in the lineup when he was pitching.

[4] In the 2003 postseason, Ortiz struggled in the ALDS against the Oakland A's until Game 4, when he hit a two-run double in the bottom of the eighth inning off closer Keith Foulke to turn a 4–3 deficit into a 5–4 Red Sox lead and eventual victory.

[23] Together they hit back-to-back home runs six times, tying the major league single-season mark set by the Detroit Tigers' Hank Greenberg and Rudy York and later matched by the Chicago White Sox's Frank Thomas and Magglio Ordóñez.

In the 2004 AL Division Series, he hit a series-winning walk-off home run off Jarrod Washburn in the 10th inning of Game 3 to knock out the Anaheim Angels.

In the 2004 World Series vs. the St. Louis Cardinals, Ortiz set the tone for the four-game sweep as he hit a three-run home run off Woody Williams in the first inning of Game 1 at Fenway Park.

On September 29, his eighth-inning home run against the Toronto Blue Jays tied the game at 4, then his ninth-inning single in his very next at-bat gave Boston the win.

He also won his first Hank Aaron Award as the outstanding hitter in the AL. On April 10, the Red Sox announced Ortiz signed a four-year, $52 million contract extension with the team.

On September 20 at Fenway Park, Ortiz tied Jimmie Foxx's single season Red Sox home run record of 50 set in 1938, in the sixth inning against Minnesota Twins' Boof Bonser.

Combined, Ortiz batted .370 with three home runs and 10 RBI and Boston swept the Colorado Rockies to win their second World Series Championship in four years.

Then, on May 21, Ortiz became only the fifth player to hit 300 home runs as a member of the Red Sox, joining Ted Williams, Carl Yastrzemski, Jim Rice, and Dwight Evans.

He finished in the top 10 in all the categories in the AL. On April 20, before the first game played at Fenway Park since the Boston Marathon bombing and his first since August 2012 after an Achilles tendon injury, Ortiz spoke emotionally to the crowd and stated, "This is our fucking city, and no one is going to dictate our freedom.

In the postseason, Ortiz hit five home runs and 13 RBI while batting .353 to lead the Red Sox to a World Series championship, the franchise's eighth.

In Game 2 of the AL Championship Series versus the Detroit Tigers, Ortiz hit a dramatic, game-tying grand slam off reliever Joaquín Benoit in the bottom of the eighth inning, helping propel the Red Sox to victory.

[49] On July 14, in an announcement prior to the MLB All-Star Game at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati, Ortiz was selected as one of the "Franchise Four" of the Boston Red Sox.

[71] Each time Ortiz crossed the plate after hitting a home run, he would look up and point both index fingers to the sky in tribute to his mother, Angela Rosa Arias, who died in a car crash in January 2002 at the age of 46.

In April 2007, sporting-goods company Reebok debuted the Big Papi 10M Mid Baseball cleat, which Ortiz first used during the 2007 MLB All Star Game in San Francisco, California.

[99] At approximately 8:50 p.m. Atlantic Standard Time on June 9, 2019, Ortiz was shot and severely wounded while at the Dial Bar and Lounge in East Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

[110] On June 19, the Dominican Attorney General's office announced that Ortiz had not been the intended victim of the gunman and that the shooting had been carried out on the orders of Victor Hugo Gomez Vasquez, a known associate of a Mexican drug cartel.

On August 8, 2009, Ortiz held a press conference before a game at Yankee Stadium and denied ever buying or using steroids and suggested the positive test might have been due to his use of supplements and vitamins at the time.