Albert Pujols is having a subpar season by his own amazing standards. (OK, I wrote this post minutes before Pujols' second straight walkoff HR. Give me a break!)

Through Saturday, he had a 127 OPS+ in this, his age 31 season. Since 1901, a total of 107 players have qualified for the batting title in their Age 31 season with an OPS+ between 122 and 132.

That group of players includes names such as Hi Myers, Heinie Peitz, Moose Solters, David Dellucci, Randy Winn, Nixey Callahan, Johnny Kling, Jeff Blauser, and Al Zarilla. That's not exactly fantastic company.

Of course, the group also includes Tris Speaker, Frank Thomas, Chuck Klein, Arky Vaughn, Larry Doby, Chick Hafey, Al Simmons, Zack Wheat, and Johnny Bench.

It's all the more striking given similar comparisons to other years from Pujols' career. For example, here are all the players to have an OPS+ between 185 and 195 in their year 28 season:

That's been done by many fewer players and, on average, a much higher class.

Here's another one for Pujols' last season: Age 30, OPS+ between 169 and 179:

It's the same story.

It's true for all players (and in fact all people) that they won't stay at their peaks forever. Pujols has to decline sometime. Thankfully, at just age 31, it seems a lot more likely that he's either distracted by his contract status or has some injury than he's just lost it.

Washington 9, Arizona 4 (11 innings): In a game that featured 5 hit batsmen and a pair of manager/pitcher ejections, 4 things stand out:

• Mike Morse broke the game open with a grand slam in the 11th, his 8th HR and 2nd salami of the year. At the end of April, Morse had a .211 BA and .268 SLG. Since May 1, he has hit .378 and slugged .707, with 7 HRs in 82 AB.
• Aaron Heilman served up a 3-run HR in the 8th. Besides his 8.84 ERA and 6 HRs in 19.1 IP, Heilman has allowed all 5 inherited runners to score this year.
• Another strong start by Ian Kennedy: 7 IP, 1 R, lowering his ERA to 3.01. If not for one disastrous game back in April (9 R in 3 IP), Kennedy would have a 2.15 ERA.
• Tyler Clippard fanned 6 of the 8 batters he faced. He came on with a 1-run lead in the 6th after Jason Marquis was ejected with 1 out and 2 aboard, and struck out Stephen Drew and Justin Upton. Clippard has 42 Ks in 34.2 IP, a 2.08 ERA and 0.92 WHIP; his 13 holds are tied for the MLB lead.

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The PI event database, which includes all games since 1974 and most games (1043 are still missing) from 1950-1973, has 10 instances of a team batting around before making their first out of the game.  Here they are in reverse chronological order. You can find the play-by-play description by clicking on the title for each game. Read the rest of this entry »

Cardinals 5, Cubs 4 (12 innings): The 2nd HR of the game by Albert Pujols won it in bottom of the 12th -- his first walk-off hit since August 28, 2009. Something tells me Albert doesn't often get much to hit in potential game-winning moments: In high-leverage situations, his career BA is .347, with .654 slugging, and he has a .451 OBP in late-and-close situations. Tonight was also his first 4-RBI game of the season, and his first game with 3 extra-base hits in almost a year.

• Of the 6 pitchers who appeared for the Cards, the highest ERA after the game was 2.41, by SP Kyle Lohse.

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Here are the 21 players since 1919 to have a stolen base in their first career game and to never steal another base in their careers:

Greg Golson will probably get off this list one day. He's injured right now but will probably play in the majors again at some point. Notice that there are a few pitchers on here--that's not terribly surprising. Pitchers don't get stolen bases too often, so a guy getting one in his first game has a better chance than a position player for that to be his only one.

[Note: The answer has been guessed, and is confirmed in comment #27.]

I've played in the majors for multiple years with multiple teams.

I have good batting numbers. Pro-rated to 650 PAs (which is less than my total), I've averaged 93 RBI, 91 Runs, 29 HRs, 7 triples, 39 doubles, 78 walks, and over 6 WAR (including a strong defensive WAR rating).

To put that 6 WAR rating into perspective, the 2010 NL MVP had 5.9 WAR; just 9 MLB position players had 6+ WAR last year.

I currently play for my home-town team, but while growing up, I just couldn't root for them.

I have played in the postseason.

Arizona 4, Washington 0: It's Joshua Collmenter's world; we just get to read his box scores. Collmenter stymied the Nats on 3 hits over 7 IP tonight, his 3rd scoreless start of 6+ IP in 5 games since joining Arizona's rotation May 14. All other D-backs pitchers combined have 4 such starts all year. The native of Homer, MI has a 1.23 ERA as a SP, 1.25 overall.

• Collmenter wasn't perfect, though; he issued a walk, raising his season rate to 0.83 BB/9 (4 walks in 43.1 IP).

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How many players have played at least 12 games at 1B, 2B, 3B and SS in the same season?

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Through games of June 2, thirteen batters are still hitting under .200 with at least 100 ABs, shown here in ascending order of BA (bold) along with their BAbip (unintentionally highlighted):

(All records mentioned below are since 1901, unless stated otherwise.)

• There are currently 5 qualifying batters hitting under .200 (LaRoche, Uggla, Dunn, Reynolds and Figgins). That would equal the season record, last done in 1917. The live-ball record is 2, in 2010 and 1940.
• Mark Reynolds is on track to become the first hitter since 1909 with more than 1 sub-.200 qualifying season.
• The lowest BA by a qualifying 1B is .196 by Carlos Pena in 2010. Adam LaRoche is hitting .172 this year.
• The lowest BA by a qualifying 2B is .179 by Mickey Doolan in 1918. Dan Uggla is hitting .175.
• The lowest BA by a qualifying DH is .205 by Darrell Evans in 1988. Adam Dunn is hitting .180.
• The lowest BA by a qualifying 3B in the live-ball era is .185 by Eddie Joost in 1943. Mark Reynolds is at .190 and Chone Figgins .191, I guess that record is safe unless one of them hits a real skid.
• The lowest BA by a qualifying OF is .179 by Rob Deer in 1991. The current .192 mark of Jonny Gomes (despite a 4-hit game last week) would be the 2nd worst, but he's fallen just off the qualifying pace.
• The lowest BA by a qualifying C is ... oh, never mind; Bill Bergen will never be equaled!

Ben Blatt of the Harvard College Sports Analysis Collective used linear programming to plan the optimal road trip to all 30 MLB stadiums.