Prince Albert Pujols, he reigneth

Perhaps pitchers are sensing he's more vulnerable this season and pitching more strikes to him? I'm pretty sure there's a way to find out somewhere but I wouldn't know where to start.

The games I've seen with him it seems like they're able to get him to chase a lot of high fastballs and good curveballs in the dirt, but he seems to have made some adjustments as of late.

Huge game last night. .300/40/100 definitely within sight; .400/.600, not going to happen.

16 rbi the harder part now. pretty amazing 11 years.

He's a little on the fence there--16 in 25 games works out to almost exactly a 100-RBI rate--but he just needs to maintain his current pace, which is historically below normal.

Currently sitting at .303/36 HR/97 RBIs.

I check the boxscore every night; .300/40/100 still within reach, although 4 HR in 8 games a stretch. He's definitely moved up the MVP ladder the past few weeks--6th or 7th?

.300/30/100 is the benchmark that he's hit the last 10 years though, and it looks like he'll come close, pending a few more RBIs.

he'd deserve MVP votes only if he manages to carry the cards to the wildcard. otherwise, i'm just remembering all of those inning-ending ground ball double plays he hit into during the doldrums of April and May.

He's up to 29 GDP, a career worst--most years he's been in the 19-23 range. .300/30/100 should be a cinch on the RBI front (3 more); if he misses, it'll be average that does him in. The Ted Williams scenario: he goes into the last game of the season hitting .299573 or something--would he play or sit (assuming the wild card's not at stake)?

How did the Cardinals end up 2.5 off the Braves in the Wild Card?

They've won 11 of their last 13 while the braves have lost a handful of close games and been kinda mediocre down the stretch

jeezus clem, sitting to protect .300, a true dinosaur-era chestnut

He'd be protecting the beauty and symmetry of his career box, not the actual (and meaningless) difference between .299 and .300...but I know you don't care about such stuff!

plus they finish at Houston, so if he can't light them up...

ha ha

Anyway, he's up to .304--likely won't even be an issue.

For my eyes only! 1-2, 1 RBI--he needs one more hit and one more RBI...and he should try to win the game, too.

.299/99...noooooo!

^numerologist

could still get game 163

eh, not looking likely...

was this his "worst" season to date?

by far

embarrassing disaster imo

It's all downhill from here now that he is finally in his late 20s.

http://pbs.twimg.com/media/BfFGBb7CMAAF3HL.jpg

I'll put this here...Didn't know you could make up and download your own WAR graphs on Fangraphs. Here's one for cumulative WAR showing Pujols' downturn the last two seasons:

http://i1059.photobucket.com/albums/t427/sayhey1/cumulativewar_zps562c47b6.png

i didn't know that either. good thing i got no plans this afternoon!

I'm kind of curious to see what Pujols and Hamilton do this year and see if they have some bounce back in them.

I still think both the Angels and Rangers look kind of thin in starting pitching. Joe Blanton is like LA's #4 and he was pretty bad last year. Both clubs got a couple of guys counted on that haven't really had a season putting up some innings.

Angels rotation last year was a dumpster fire. I blame arte for the fixation on declining sluggers..

pujols will presumably be at least a bit healthier this year. he was such a mess last season. i bet he'll be better but still off his second half pace from 2012

yeah, if he's truly 100% from his injuries, or even close, i think he's a great bounce-back candidate. after watching him play a ton of games in STL, he was really showing some wear and tear even in 2010 and 2011. noticeably limping, all the time. and he was still playing pretty well in those years! given that he's turning 39 this year, i think that his upside is a repeat of 2011 (4.4 fWAR, .299/.384/.541)

also he dropped his lawsuit against asshole jack clark, because clark issued an apology. the most sincere apologies are issued months after the fact, with a pending lawsuit

"given that he's turning 39 this year"

heh

The ghost of Steve Shasta lives!

494, getting close. (If it still means anything--it should.)

Obviously too early to tell, but I get the feeling he's going to settle into a Frank Thomas-like second half of his career: the power will come and go, and he'll still have some big home-run years, but BA and OBP markedly down from his prime.

Will be even worse because most of Pujols OBP was driven by IBB. Without those and with the average plummeting he might never get an OPS higher than 900 again.

If he spends a few years hitting behind a decent leadoff hitter and Mike Trout then he'll see loads of pitches with men on base, which will boost his BA and a bunch of other counting stats.

Hasn't he spent the last two years hitting behind Trout though to little effect?

He has been playing through an injury for the last 3 years. I'm expecting a very good year from in 2014, actually.

lol WARP3

not sure how accurate it is to say his OBP has been "driven" by IBBs when the guy averaged 130 walks a season

Alex's statement sounded odd to me too, but I checked, and he's right--a high percentage of Pujols' walks have been intentional over his career. Here are the top 26 HR guys (everyone with 500+, plus Pujols) reordered according to their IBB/BB percentages:

Banks -- 0.275 (missing first two seasons)
Bonds -- 0.269
Pujols -- 0.258
Aaron -- 0.213 (missing first season)
McCovey -- 0.193
Griffey -- 0.188
Murray -- 0.167
Sosa -- 0.166
Manny -- 0.163
Ted Williams -- 0.160 (last six seasons only)
Frank Robinson -- 0.154
Mays -- 0.145 (missing first three seasons)
Schmidt -- 0.133
Palmeiro -- 0.127
Reggie Jackson -- 0.119
McGwire -- 0.114
Killebrew -- 0.103 (missing first season)
Frank Thomas -- 0.101
Thome -- 0.099
Mathews -- 0.091
Sheffield -- 0.088
Mantle -- 0.087 (missing first four seasons)
A-Rod -- 0.074
Ruth -- n/a
Foxx -- n/a
Ott -- n/a

(My way of avoiding the drudgery of marking book reports.)

Obviously overall lineup strength plays a part in this (significant, I would guess), and also prevailing managerial strategies through the years, but holy cow, Banks--I would have bet my house on Bonds having the highest percentage. And lineup aside, Mantle's figure is weirdly low. Williams' figure is only for his age 36-41 seasons; bet he was up around 20% in his prime.

Pujols has only drawn 100 walks three times in his career, and never more than 115 in a season. Over a quarter of them have been intentional.

Trivia question I tripped over in a article about his impending 500th: who was slated to play left field for the Cardinals the year he broke in?

Cabrera's 0.225 would place him fourth on that list.

Trivia question I tripped over in a article about his impending 500th: who was slated to play left field for the Cardinals the year he broke in?

Lou Brock

Oh, wait -- you said "broke in," not "born."

Brock was slated to play left field for the Jays this year, but no.

oh i feel like we've had this conversation before -- on bbref, the BB columnn includes IBBs, right? that's confusing

Yes.

Mario Mendoza -- 0.077 (Mantle/A-Rod territory)...which may or may not say something about how meaningful a stat this is.

xposts bobby bonilla, right?