124 and counting

Much has been made about David Ortiz still searching for his first homer a month into the season, but he's actually just one of several big-name veterans stuck on zero long balls. Here are the homerless hitters with at least 100 plate appearances:

                     PA                             PA
Carl Crawford       126        David Eckstein      114
David Ortiz         124        Chone Figgins       112
Nyjer Morgan        124        Bobby Abreu         108
James Loney         117        Willy Taveras       105
Adrian Beltre       116        Akinori Iwamura     105
Miguel Tejada       116        Russell Martin      104
Orlando Cabrera     115        Casey Kotchman      101
Placido Polanco     115        Carlos Guillen      101

For many of those hitters going over 100 plate appearances without a homer is no big deal, but Ortiz, Adrian Beltre, and Bobby Abreu each had 20-plus homers last season and Miguel Tejada, Carl Crawford, Russell Martin, James Loney, and Carlos Guillen are also noteworthy inclusions. Tejada has 13 total homers in 185 games since the Astros gave up Luke Scott and three prospects to get him from the Orioles last offseason.

Crawford added power to his speed-based game with 18 homers as a 24-year-old in 2006, but he's gone deep a total of just 19 times in 280 games since. Of course, it's tough to complain much when he's hitting .306 with a .381 on-base percentage and is on pace for 100 steals. Similarly, even without homering Abreu has been great through two dozen games with the Angels, hitting .344 and going 11-for-11 swiping bases.

As for Ortiz, he's now gone 130 plate appearances without a homer dating back to last season, which actually qualifies as just the fourth-longest homer drought of his career. Of course, each of the three longer droughts came as a member of the Twins. You know, back when more people called him "David Arias" than "Big Papi."

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