Ortiz fuels comeback talk with cryptic tweet at newspaper

The saga of David Ortiz's retirement - at least, he was still retired last we heard - marches on.

Whispers of Ortiz possibly making a comeback in 2017 have never really died down over the winter, and a new chapter was written Monday night thanks to a cryptic tweet from the former Boston Red Sox legend directed at the Boston Globe newspaper.

The Globe's account immediately responded, hoping to perhaps get the scoop on a comeback story.

Ortiz did not respond to the Globe; as of Tuesday morning, the original tweet at the paper remains his most recent tweet.

Speculation in Red Sox nation picked up as well, with fans pleading for the 41-year-old to return for one more go-around after his spectacular farewell campaign in 2016.

The tweet came little over a month after Ortiz's December Instagram post claimed the Red Sox acquisition of Chris Sale had "got me thinking." It's still highly unlikely, though, as Red Sox president Dave Dombrowski noted in an interview last month.

"I know David well enough and I know that if he really had sincere interest, that he would call," Dombrowski said at the time.

The moral of this story, then? Please, Big Papi, don't put your unlocked phone in your back pocket.