Albert Pujols

From BR Bullpen

Jose Alberto Pujols (Prince Albert, Phat Albert, The Machine, or El Hombre)

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 6' 3", Weight 210-230 lb.
• High School Fort Osage High School
• School Maple Woods Community College
• Debut April 2, 2001

• Born January 16, 1980 in Santo Domingo, D.R.

BR page

[edit] Biographical Information

"The man is good at every little thing he does." - Mike Easler

"When that ball flew over our heads, I turned to Mike Mason, our bullpen coach, and said, 'That's why they pay that guy a hundred million bucks.' "— Ray King, watching in the bullpen when Albert Pujols hit a key post-season home run in 2005

Albert Pujols was quite possibly the best player of the 2000-2009 decade. Based on the similarity scores method, the most similar player to Pujols, at ages 21-27, was Joe DiMaggio. At ages 28-30, it was Jimmie Foxx. The second-most similar player to Pujols, in 2010, was Frank Robinson.

Pujols won the National League MVP award in 2005, 2008 and 2009, but that shouldn't obscure the fact that he was also in the top four in the MVP Award voting in each of 2001-2004 and 2006. He won the Rookie of the Year Award in 2001.

Born in the Dominican Republic, Pujols moved to the United States in the early 1990s. He briefly attended a Missouri community college and in 1999 was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals in the 13th round.

The year 2000 was his only one in the minors. At age 20, he played most of the season for Peoria in the Class A Midwest League, posting a batting line of .324/.389/.565 with 17 home runs. He was the league's MVP. His teammate Ben Johnson hit 13 home runs, but with a much lower batting average. Pujols then spent 21 games with Potomac in the Carolina League and 3 games with Memphis in the Pacific Coast League to finish out 2000. He hit a walk-off home run to win the PCL Championship Series for Memphis.

His major league seasons from 2001-2009 were uniformly excellent. The lowest batting average he posted was .314, his lowest home run total was 32, and his lowest RBI total was 103. He even stole 16 bases in 18 attempts in 2005.

Pujols in Aug. 2009

There is no way to know what the future will bring, but after his first nine years, Pujols had the fourth highest slugging percentage in the history of the game, behind Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, and Lou Gehrig, and ahead of Barry Bonds. Of course, those players did it over the course of a career, while Pujols still has many years to play.

If anything negative could be said about his play, it's that his range defensively early in his career could have been better. However, he is a multi-position player, having appeared in left field, right field, third base, and first base during his career, and even once apiece at shortstop in 2002 and second base in 2008. He switched largely to first base in 2004-2006, and won a Gold Glove at the position in 2006. In 2009, he set a record for assists by a first baseman.

2006 was a typical season offensively for Pujols, except his slugging was a bit better than usual. He played on the 2006 World Series-winning Cardinal team, and while he hit only .200, it was a low-hitting series, with the Cardinals as a team hitting .228 and the Detroit Tigers hitting .199. In 2006, Albert Pujols reached 2,000 career total bases in just 854 games, making him the quickest player ever to achieve that mark. The record had been 869 games by Nomar Garciaparra. He lost the 2006 NL MVP race to Ryan Howard, 388 points to 347. The Dominican Republic sports ministry arranged a news conference for Pujols, where he vented that a player from a non-playoff team should not win the MVP. It should be pointed out that Howard's team won two more games than Pujols' team and only missed the playoffs because they played in a tougher division.

Pujols hit his 300th home run on July 4, 2008. It made him the 5th-youngest player to hit 300 as he was 28 years and 170 days old, one day younger than Mel Ott. Alex Rodriguez, Jimmie Foxx, Ken Griffey Jr. and Andruw Jones had reached 300 at younger ages than Pujols.

In 2009, Pujols broke Bill Buckner's major league record of 184 assists by a first baseman. Mark Grace had held the NL mark. Even though he was not yet 30 years old at the end of 2009, he already ranked # 31 on the all-time list for points as determined by the Hall of Fame Monitor. The scale is such that 130 points "is a virtual cinch" to get into the Hall, while Pujols already had 226 points. That year, Pujols reached 100 RBI, just like his 8 prior seasons; that broke a tie with Ted Williams for the second-longest stretch to open a career. Only Al Simmons (11 years) had a longer run of 100-RBI seasons to begin a career.

Pujols hit his 400th career home run on August 26, 2010, off Jordan Zimmermann. He became the 47th major leaguer to reach that figure and the third-youngest after Alex Rodriguez and Ken Griffey Jr. In June 2011, Pujols hit game-winning, game-ending, extra-inning homers in consecutive games; no major leaguer had done that since Albert Belle in 1995 and no National Leaguer since Ron Santo in 1966. However, he finished the season with the worst offensive numbers of his career: a .299 batting average (his first time under .300), 37 homers and 99 RBI (his first time below 100). For all that, he was still one of the top offensive forces in the major leagues.

After struggling in the first two games of the 2011 World Series, Pujols set or tied four records in Game 3. He went deep 3 times, drove in six runs, had 5 hits and 14 total bases. He tied the home run record held by Babe Ruth and Reggie Jackson, the RBI record held by Bobby Richardson and Hideki Matsui and the hit mark held by Paul Molitor. He set a new total bases record, breaking the record of 12 shared by Ruth and Jackson.m he may not have done much the rest of the Series, but his one-game performance was of utmost importance in helping the Cardinals win a tightly-fought 7-game series over the Texas Rangers, giving him a second Championship ring.

Shortly after the 2011 World Series, Pujols became a free agent. The Cardinals wanted to retain his services, but they were far from the only serious suitors for his services, and had to drop out of the bidding when they were reluctant to go over $200 million or 9 years. On December 8th, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim announced they had won the sweepstakes, signing Albert to a 10-year contract worth $254 million - the second largest contract of all time after Alex Rodriguez's extension signed after the 2008 season. The signing immediately led to speculation in Southern California that the Angels would dump various players or move them to other positions in order to accomodate Pujols' salary and need to play either DH or first base.

[edit] Notable Achievements

• 2000 MVP Midwest League Peoria Chiefs
• 2001 NL Rookie of the Year Award
• 2001 Topps All-Star Rookie Team
• 9-time NL All-Star (2001 & 2003-2010)
• 3-time NL MVP (2005, 2008 & 2009)
• 2004 NLCS MVP
• 2-time NL Gold Glove Winner (2006/1B & 2010/1B)
• 6-time NL Silver Slugger Award Winner (2001/3B, 2003/OF, 2004/1B & 2008-2010/1B)
• NL Batting Average Leader (2003)
• NL On-Base Percentage Leader (2009)
• 3-time NL Slugging Percentage Leader (2006, 2008 & 2009)
• 3-time NL OPS Leader (2006, 2008 & 2009)
• 5-time NL Runs Scored Leader (2003-2005, 2009 & 2010)
• NL Hits Leader (2003)
• 4-time NL Total Bases Leader (2003, 2004, 2008 & 2009)
• NL Doubles Leader (2003)
• 2-time NL Home Runs Leader (2009 & 2010)
• NL RBI Leader (2010)
• 20-Home Run Seasons: 11 (2001-2011)
• 30-Home Run Seasons: 11 (2001-2011)
• 40-Home Run Seasons: 6 (2003-2006, 2009 & 2010)
• 100 RBI Seasons: 10 (2001-2010)
• 100 Runs Scored Seasons: 10 (2001-2006 & 2008-2011)
• 200 Hits Seasons: 1 (2003)
• Won two World Series with the St. Louis Cardinals in 2006 and 2011

[edit] Records Held

• Most RBI by an NL rookie, 130, 2001
• Most Extra Base Hits by a rookie, 83, 2001
• Assists, first baseman, season, 185, 2009
• Consecutive seasons of 30 or more home runs, from start of career, 11
• Consecutive seasons of 30 home runs, 100 RBI and .300 batting average from start of career, 10
• Most home runs in first 3 seasons, 114, 2001-03 (tied with Ralph Kiner)
• Most home runs in first 9 seasons, 366, 2001-09
• Most home runs in first 10 seasons, 408, 2001-10
• Most home runs in first 11 seasons, 445, 2001-11

[edit] Related Sites

• Albert Pujols on mlb.com
• Summary of Pujols' amateur career
• Albert Pujos @ Baseballaha.com