Best Selling Books by David Ortiz

David "Big Papi" Ortiz is a baseball icon and one of the most popular figures ever to play the game. As a key part of the Boston Red Sox for 14 years, David has helped the team win 3 World Series, bringing back a storied franchise from "never wins" to "always wins." He helped them upend the doubts, the naysayers, the nonbelievers and captured the imagination of millions of fans along the way, as he launched balls into the stands again, and again, and again. He made Boston and the Red Sox his home, his place of work, and his legacy. In Papi, his ultimate memoir, Ortiz opens up as never before about his life in baseball and about the problems he sees in Major League Baseball, about former teammates, opponents, coaches, and executives, and about the weight of expectation whenever he stepped up to the plate. The result is a revelatory, fly-on-the wall story of a career by a player with a lot to say at the end of his time in the game, a game to which he gave so much and which gave so much to him.

The Boston Red Sox All-Star slugger recounts his childhood in the impoverished Dominican Republic, his lesser achievements with the Mariners and Twins, and the influence of his parents on his athletic achievements.

Disruptions are increasing in North American supply chains. North American freight transport capacity is threatening economic competitiveness. Rising shipping costs, increasingly lengthy shipping times, increasingly variable transit times, and increasingly large inventories are all evidence of constraints in the freight transport system. As North American manufacturing and retail's reliance on imports has increased, highway and rail infrastructure has been neither maintained nor expanded in critical places. Other factors, such as increased fuel prices, security requirements, border delays, and a shortage of truck drivers are eroding the freight transport system's performance. Consequently, shippers are stocking more parts and supplies, resorting to expensive backup transportation, and revisiting facility location decisions to cope with disruptions. In February 2006, more than 30 U.S. and Canadian private- and public-sector stakeholders met to discuss the declining performance of the North American freight transport system and to determine strategies for increasing freight transportation capacity. Participants identified examples of current and expected economic effects of capacity constraints on the freight transport system. They also highlighted specific physical, contractual, and regulatory constraints to the free movement of freight and charted a path toward addressing the most pressing issues through public-sector, private-sector, and joint action. This document summarizes the workshop discussions and the participants' consensus.