Albert Pujols

“And You Were Going to Hate Him For the Rest of Your Life”

With apologies to Clark Gable as Rhett Butler…

Back at the end of the 2011, when Albert Pujols left the Cardinals, I wasn’t very charitable. As a matter of fact, I was convinced I was going to hate him forever. In retrospect, it’s kind of embarrassing just how angry I was and just how personally I took it. I think that goes to show how much our local athletes mean to us, when that sense of betrayal cuts so deep. At the time, I didn’t want him to be happy or successful without the Cardinals, and I certainly didn’t want to see his team win.

But as the years went by, I realized how ridiculous that was. I mean, I wasn’t going to cheer for him, but I realized I didn’t hate him, and never actually had. Time heals all wounds, I guess, and time did indeed march on, and my resentment faded, to the point that when he returned to Busch Stadium in an opposing uniform, I was actually happy to see him back in “Baseball Heaven.” It made me smile to see the ovation he got from the people of St. Louis, because he deserved it.

And then more recently, the rumors started swirling that he and the Cardinals were talking…we are going to need a DH this season after all (not thrilled about the DH development, but at least now there’s a silver lining to it!). At first it started out as a near-impossibility, as he was also in talks with other teams. But then the rumors started to ramp up, and it sounded like maybe, against all odds, he was going to come home to finish his career. A fairytale ending that baseball and the city of St. Louis needed.

The words that Bernie Miklasz wrote over a decade ago about Albert’s departure suddenly flipped the narrative:

“…but I still suffer from the disease of naiveté. Baseball does this to a lot of people, me included. Makes us all sappy and romantic. You want the hero to stay and complete the storybook. But it doesn’t work that way in modern sports. Not very often, anyway.”

I guess just this once, in the end, it did work out exactly that way. The hero may not have spent his entire career here, but he was here when it counted, and he returned to complete the storybook. A fairytale ending.

Couch Slouch: Albert Pujols’s California dreams quickly turn to nightmares

Love this article from the Washington Post! Comparing Albert Pujols to New Coke? Ouch! But so very deserved…

A year ago, Albert Pujols was a post-modern Stan Musial. Today, he is a living, breathing “John Carter.”

(“John Carter” cost $250 million or so to make and was a bust at the box office. Pujols cost $250 million or so to land and has been a bust at the ballpark.)

Pujols thought he was going to Disneyland; instead, he’s wound up in Dante’s Inferno.

In the offseason, Pujols, 32, left St. Louis for Southern California. He became the second baseball player ever to sign a contract worth more than $200 million — remarkably, Alex Rodriguez has done it twice, with the Rangers and the Yankees — and might become the first player to return the money with a note that says, “Oops — can’t hit no more.”

Pujols is the only player in MLB history to hit 30 or more home runs in each of his first 11 seasons; in this, his 12th season, he has one.

He’s averaged 40.5 homers a season in his career; he’s currently on pace to hit five. Pujols — a career .326 hitter — is batting .196.

Right now, he couldn’t hit the side of a barn if he fell asleep with his bat resting on the side of a barn.

If he jumped out of a boat in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, he might not hit water.

He went without a homer in his first 27 games as an Angel, sat out one game, then finally connected in his 28th game and 111th at-bat with the team.

Have I mentioned Pujols has one homer this season? I hate to be critical, but how hard can it be? Heck, Josh Hamilton hit four homers last week in less than 21 / 2 hours.

Pujols — at least publicly — is not fazed by the power outage: “I come out here every day and try to get myself ready for the game and give 110 percent to this team.”

(I always worry when that number is cited, like when O.J. Simpson said he was “110 percent not guilty.”)

Now, if Pujols — who signed a 10-year contract — doesn’t defunkify, we’re looking at something that goes beyond massive free agent bust; he’s entering hallowed cultural territory.

Here are, unofficially, the five biggest flops of the last half-century in American life:

●New Coke (1985): Was anybody complaining about Coca-Cola? What were they thinking? This was like adding skylights and terraces to the Pyramids.

●Chevy Chase’s talk show (1993): Magic Johnson’s talk show actually was worse, but he was a point guard; Chase is an entertainer.

●Ben-Gay Aspirin (1990s): Yes, Ben-Gay Aspirin. For real. I mean, I’ll smear that delightfully smelly stuff on my back, but do I care to swallow it?

●Dennis Miller on “Monday Night Football” (2000-01): I still have nightmares of the former funny guy referring to Coach Mike Shanahan as “Shanny” 37 times in four quarters.

●Susan B. Anthony dollar (1979-81, 1999): Hey, I was as big a fan of women’s suffrage as the next guy, but I don’t want some feminist coin rolling around my pocket ruining the feng shui of my favorite quarters and dimes.

Frankly, Pujols never should’ve abandoned the Cardinals. Stan The Man never left St. Louis. The Gateway Arch has never left St. Louis.

In addition, Pujols didn’t consider the adjustment of living in Southern California. St. Louis is so small, most players walk to games; Los Angeles is so large, most players helicopter to games.

Plus Pujols failed to grasp the geography of the area. He thought he was coming to L.A. when, in fact, he was coming to Orange County. He likely was thrown by the “Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim” moniker, which is marketing malarkey.

(It’s like real estate that’s labeled “Beverly Hills adjacent,” which means you live near the rich but not among them — if you’re lucky, you can get a whiff of the foie gras from their trash bins.)

In Pujols’s defense, SoCal makes fools of a lot of people. For instance, sources tell me ex-Laker Lamar Odom wasn’t even sure which Kardashian he was marrying; next thing you know, he’s down and out in Dallas.

Anyway, there’s still hope for Pujols — as it turns out, “John Carter” is doing pretty well overseas. Hmm. Is there a Gateway Arch in Japan?

via Couch Slouch: Albert Pujols’s California dreams quickly turn to nightmares – The Washington Post.

Please Stop Insulting Our Intelligence

I’ve stayed away from writing about the whole Albert Pujols situation, partly because it makes me so angry, and partly because I didn’t think it deserved any more attention.

But, I’ve gotten angrier, and writing is cathartic, so…

It would be really nice if Albert, and his wife Deidre, would stop insulting the Cardinals fans’ intelligence. If I hear “It wasn’t about the money,” one more time, I may scream. Of course it was about the money…it’s always about the money. At least Lance Berkman was honest enough to own up to that fact earlier this year. But Albert, the man who two years ago claimed that he wanted to stay in St. Louis forever, and didn’t need an extra three or four million a year somewhere else because he’d already made his money? He wants us to keep believing that the reason he left St. Louis for Los Angeles was for some nobler purpose, some idealistic reason having to do with commitment, and not money at all?

Please.

Yes, the Cardinals most recent offer was for “only” five years. Perfectly reasonable, if you ask me, given Pujols’s (reported) age. But lets not forget that prior to that, there had been a 10-year deal, with the added incentive of having some sort of stake in the team, some kind of front-office job, and a lasting legacy here in St. Louis. He was set to become the next “Stan the Man” here in town; he almost certainly would have had a statue outside the first base gate someday, as a testament to his time and success here. The fans loved him, even when his performance slumped, and would have continued to love him, even as age started to take its toll, as it certainly would have. That’s the kind of town St. Louis is; that’s the kind of fans the Cardinals have. That’s why they call this “baseball heaven.”

But we weren’t committed to him. Right.

I’m with columnist Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. He tried to be sensible about this unpleasant situation, and not cast blame. But, like many Cardinals fans, myself included, all he had to hear was Albert’s very insulting press conference with the Angels to get his ire up. When your town’s (former) hero turns on you, and openly states that the team, the organization, and by extension, the city, weren’t committed to him, you can’t help but get mad, and call a spade a spade. In the end, Bernie was spot on with his first reaction to this whole mess:

I’ve mentioned this before, and will talk about it again: the sentimental side of me wanted Pujols to remain with the Cardinals for his entire career. I know better, but I still suffer from the disease of naiveté. Baseball does this to a lot of people, me included. Makes us all sappy and romantic. You want the hero to stay and complete the storybook. But it doesn’t work that way in modern sports. Not very often, anyway. 

That about sums it up–we baseball fans are a bunch of romantics at heart, and even though common sense says otherwise, we want to believe that we’ll get our happy ending–all of us, players and fans alike. After all, “faith is believing in things when common sense tells you not to,”* right? So, our initial reaction of shock and dismay, was honest and real, even though we may have tried to justify it after the fact. And our anger and disgust are equally justified, especially after hearing our support criticized.

It’s all about the money, Albert. It always has been, and always will be. Stop deluding yourself, and stop insulting the people of St. Louis. We know where your loyalties lie, now more than ever.

 

*With thanks to George Seaton, and by extension, Fred Gailey in Miracle on 34th Street, for summarizing faith so well.