It was June 2001, the primary half of the primary season of a profession no one noticed coming. Albert Pujols was again in Kansas Metropolis, Mo., the place he had performed two years earlier for a neighborhood faculty that had by no means produced a significant league participant. Now, as a St. Louis Cardinals rookie, he was someway batting .350 with a number of house runs. However how good was he, actually?
“The sensation that day was that you simply’ve bought this complete lineup of 10-year veterans coming at you — Mark McGwire, Jim Edmonds — so don’t let any of these guys beat you,” mentioned Chad Durbin, who began that night time for the Royals, recalling a scouting assembly with a coach. “Jamie Quirk advised me, ‘I believe your stuff goes to beat Pujols’ — and he didn’t even name him that, he pronounced it improper. You simply didn’t know a lot about him.”
The schooling was swift and convincing. Pujols singled twice earlier than punishing a curveball for a homer within the ninth inning, spoiling Durbin’s probability for his first profession full sport. It was the twentieth profession house run for Pujols on a journey that has lasted greater than 20 years.
“That house run off me is sufficiently old to drink; it’s sufficiently old to go order a beer on the bar,” mentioned Durbin, who’s 44 and has been retired for 9 years. “I used to be doing good by baseball, although, simply making an attempt to assist the sport out. I did my half.”
Pujols has mentioned he’ll retire on the finish of this season, and on Friday he gained his race towards the tip. He reached 700 profession house runs by homering twice towards the Dodgers in Los Angeles, becoming a member of probably the most unique house run neighborhood of all. Earlier than Pujols, solely Babe Ruth (in 1934), Hank Aaron (1973) and Barry Bonds (2004) had reached 700.
Bonds completed his profession with probably the most homers, 762, adopted by Aaron at 755 and Ruth at 714. However Pujols, on this age of specialization and supersized bullpens, has homered off extra pitchers than anybody: 455.
“Individuals ask me on a regular basis: ‘Who’s the hardest hitter you ever confronted?’” mentioned Glendon Rusch, 47, who gave up three homers to Pujols in 40 profession at-bats. “And I all the time say Albert. Particularly when he was in his prime, he may do probably the most harm in probably the most alternative ways.”
Ruth unfold his homers throughout 216 completely different pitchers, and Aaron throughout 310. Each sluggers retired lengthy earlier than the introduction of interleague play in 1997, halfway via Bonds’s profession. Bonds linked off 449 completely different pitchers, a mark Pujols reached on Aug. 22 towards Drew Smyly of the Chicago Cubs.
“How he’s enjoying proper now, he’s undoubtedly a distinct Albert Pujols than what I noticed when he was with the Angels,” Smyly mentioned. “I by no means bought an opportunity to face him when he was with the Cardinals early in his profession, when he was simply probably the most dominant participant on the market. However proper now it feels as if he’s that man once more.”
Pujols is ending with a flourish almost as inconceivable as his rise initially. Taking part in on a part-time foundation in his farewell season, his .509 slugging share via Thursday was his highest since 2011, the ultimate yr of his first stint in St. Louis.
Pujols averaged greater than 40 homers per yr with the Cardinals from 2001 via 2011, slugging .617 total. Then he left for a $240 million contract with the Angels, and averaged simply 23 homers per yr with a .448 slugging share throughout the 10-year deal. The Angels launched him final Could, and he completed the 2021 season with the Dodgers.
But whereas Pujols batted simply .256 with the Angels — in comparison with .328 earlier than that — his presence all the time loomed for opposing pitchers, particularly with runners on base. Pujols, who trails solely Aaron and Ruth on the profession record for R.B.I., with 2,208, drove in a minimum of 93 runs in six of his first eight seasons with the Angels.
“Within the Anaheim days, clearly he didn’t hit for common, however I believe R.B.I.s are an enormous factor, and he had over 100 R.B.I.s for a very good stretch,” mentioned the right-hander Taijuan Walker of the Mets. “He was all the time productive. He did his job to drive guys in, and that could possibly be with a sac fly or a double he’d poke the opposite approach. That’s what made it robust.”
Walker added his identify to Pujols’s record with profession house run No. 587 in September 2016. Walker, who was then with the Seattle Mariners, had held Pujols to 1 hit in 10 at-bats earlier than then, however this was not his day.
“I don’t even know if I bought an out — house run, house run, house run, hit the showers,” mentioned Walker, who gave up three in a row and bought solely two outs within the first inning. “Albert completed it off for me. I believe it was a fastball, left-center. It was fairly deep, too. I keep in mind they mentioned he couldn’t get to the fastball up, however he may get to it down, so I used to be making an attempt to beat him up. And I believe a number of his house runs now are up.”
That was the pitch Smyly tried final month within the seventh inning of a scoreless sport at Wrigley Area: a 1-2 fastball at 93 miles an hour, excessive above the outer half of the plate. Pujols swatted it into the primary row of the left discipline bleachers for homer No. 693, the one run of the sport. The pitch was 4.23 toes off the bottom, in line with Statcast, making it the second-highest pitch hit for a homer within the majors this season.
“Early within the sport, although, I threw him a curveball down under the zone — and he hit that off the wall, too,” Smyly mentioned. “He’s simply locked in.”
Pujols broke one other scoreless tie towards the Cubs on Sept. 4 at Busch Stadium in St. Louis, lifting Brandon Hughes’s fastball for a towering drive over the left discipline bullpen within the eighth inning. Hughes, a rookie, insisted that Pujols’s résumé made no distinction to him — “I don’t put a reputation on a hitter after I’m on the market,” he mentioned — however he clearly knew Pujols’s historical past.
“I’m from Detroit, so we misplaced to the Cardinals,” mentioned Hughes, who was 10 years outdated when Pujols led St. Louis to the 2006 World Sequence title. “I say ‘we,’ as a result of I used to be a Tigers fan rising up.”
Pujols homered to proper discipline off Justin Verlander in Recreation 1 of that World Sequence, demonstrating a trait he’s recognized for. Among the many many pitchers he has overwhelmed for homers are a few of the finest to ever take the mound.
“Jim Leyland talked about this after I was in Detroit with him: ‘Albert Pujols and people guys, they hit actually good pitching rather well,’” Durbin mentioned, referring to the previous Tigers supervisor. “That’s what I take into consideration with Albert: he hit good, high quality pitches actually laborious — after which while you made errors, he punished these. And that’s the distinction between the blokes which have a .280 profession common with 350 house runs, which is a heck of a profession, and a man like him.”
Ace pitchers from the final decade typically confounded Pujols; Corey Kluber and Chris Sale have mixed to carry him to a few hits in 44 at-bats, with only one house run (off the left-handed Sale in 2012).
However contemplate this larger assortment of largely retired standouts, a bunch with 23 Cy Younger Awards amongst them: Roger Clemens, Tom Glavine, Randy Johnson, Clayton Kershaw, Greg Maddux and Johan Santana. Pujols smashed 10 homers off them — together with 5 off Johnson — whereas batting a mixed .367.
A .367 common is one level higher than the best profession mark in historical past, by Ty Cobb. So whereas Pujols will all the time symbolize slugging, keep in mind that energy was solely a part of the bundle.
Towards Clemens, Glavine, Johnson, Kershaw, Maddux and Santana, he was even higher than Cobb.