David Ortiz stands at the center of Boston sports. He stands at Fenway Park, microphone in hand as the 30,000+ fans packed into the stands await whatever words of condolence or uplift he has prepared.
It turns out he has prepared none and yet here he stands, preparing to play in his first game since a freak achilles injury the year before with this microphone in his hand and a city on his shoulders. Less than 5 days earlier, that city upon his shoulders had been attacked by two men with a kind of hate in their minds we hate to admits exists and at that very moment, less than 1 mile and a half away, yellow tape blocked off Copley Square and broken glass and disheveled barricades littered the Square’s sidewalks.
And so as David Ortiz prepared to speak that day, no one expected or even wanted him to say this it was all alright. What we wanted, what we were given was an emotionally charged battle cry that said to this city, those vile monsters who bombed us and the entire world that we were Boston Strong.
“Alright Boston,” he said pausing “this jersey that we wear today, it don’t say Red Sox, it say Boston.” He paused again, contemplating what to say next “We want to thank you mayor Menino, governor Patrick, the whole police department for the great job they did this past week.” With one final pause, the camera on NESN’s broadcast of the game panned over to the line of officials standing beside Ortiz. But the focus soon returned to him.
“This is our f***** city and nobody is goanna dictate our freedom, stay strong” He boomed slamming his first to the sky and walking off to a booming echo of strength and power that never left the hearts of Bostonians.
The speech took 51 seconds and yet is was the turning point in the story surrounding the Marathon Bombing. On that day, one of the suspects in the bombing has been killed while the other had been arrested. Our plight our fear had been ended and as we cheered in delight as that man, David Ortiz, screamed the most famous F-Bomb in Red Sox history to his city we proved to ourselves, to the world that we were strong.
And Ortiz was never punished for swearing on national television. He should not have been punished because he really did speak from the heart with that phrase. And yet he prepared nothing.
It was reported by Boston sports writer Gordan Edes Ortiz said in the dugout prior to the speech “The boy they killed was 8, my boy is 8”.
Ortiz of course was talking about Martin Richard who became a martyr for peace after he was brutally killed by the second of the 2 bombs.
So was that the inspiration. Maybe. You see, this speech was something not said out of anger, it had fear, understanding that 3 people who were far too young were killed by this bombing and all of it was intentional.
During all the pauses he took during his speech, Ortiz was thinking, going over in his mind the words he was about to say as he knew that he needed them to be perfect. And they were.
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