The First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech, of the press, and of association. So, as an expression of patriotic gratitude, today I am exercising my right to free association.
You should probably read the whole post, and enjoy it, if you want to avoid some awkward questions at your next confirmation hearing.
Among the 51 interesting facts about Ichiro published Monday on MLB.com, the one I found most intriguing was #45:
- Ichiro was intentionally walked 181 times in his career and led the league three times. That’s 84 more intentional walks than Alex Rodriguez had in his career.
Alex Rodriguez hit 696 homers, 4th all time until Albert Pujols passes him. Pujols hit # 693 Monday night, playing for the Kaline Drive. I drafted Pujols as a rookie in 2002 for the final season of the old league. My Garden City KingBees (named after Ryan and Melissa [who were born in Garden City, MI] and as advocacy for male liberation in the apian community) that year had Pujols at 3b, A-Rod at ss, Barry Bonds and Magglio Ordonez in the outfield, Lance Berkman at 1b. The league pooped out before the season was over. I may have been in first place at the time.
I can’t remember if I had Edgar Martinez that season — I did at some point on the KingBees. He and Roger Clemens were the only two players (I believe) who played for both the KingBees and the Wolverines. Lance Berkman might have been a third such player. This was before I came to my harder-line position on steroid use.
Anyway — I am happy for the Drive that they get to enjoy (and benefit from!) Albert’s end-of-career surge. The man is leading Kaline this week with a 2.025 OPS (9 for 15 with 4 homers and a hbp). He’s leading the Drive for the season with an OPS of .883. He hasn’t OPSed .883 for a season since he left St. Louis almost 11 years ago. (What if he had never left St. Louis? Might he be looking at the all-time lead in homers?) On Saturday Pujols went 4 for 4 with two homers, and then the Cardinals pinch hit for him in the ninth in a game they were leading only 8 – 7 with a man on second base. I bet there were some very unhappy fans in the stands that day, and in Kaline. But Rosebud debutant Nolan Gorman batted instead, drove in a run, and scored as part of an 8-run inning. So Pujols’ spot in the lineup went 5 for 5 with 3 runs scored and 3 rbi.
Now Gorman will be able to tell his grandkids about the time he pinch hit for Albert Pujols when Pujols was 4 for 4 with two homers, and helped spark an 8-run game-securing rally.
And how about that HBP? That was last Friday by debutant Tommy Henry, a Wolverine (the U of Michigan kind, not Old Detroit … yet) who has had 4 starts for the Diamondbacks, winning 2 and losing 2. Henry struck Pujols out in the first inning, getting him to whiff on a 3 – 2 86.4 mph slider, the hardest pitch he threw to Pujols in that at-bat. This was after giving up a two-out homer to Paul Goldschmidt on another 3-2 pitch, a 92.5 mph fastball, followed by a double to Nolan Arenado on another fastball (90.0 mph). Apparently Henry is a quick learner. He learns quicker than his fastball flies.
I brought up Henry because of the story he can tell his grandkids. “I faced the Hall-of-Famer Albert Pujols. I struck him out, and then I hit him.”
Henry went 5.1 innings, the only run scoring on Goldschmidt’s first-inning homer — but that was enough to pin the loss on him. And Henry’s already a Wolverine, in a way. And he neutralized Pujols successfully… He’s a left-handed junkballer. So is he more likely to be the next Jamie Moyer (50.0 bWAR lifetime, “tied” with Mark Langston for 103rd on the all-time list among pitchers)? Or is he the next Tommy Milone (3.7 lifetime bWAR, 8.5 bWAR below the 1000th-ranked pitcher in MLB history).
Speaking of bWAR, Pujols is the current active leader in lifetime bWAR (of course). His 1.2 WAR this year has pushed him over the 100-bWAR mark to 100.8. This is remarkable because after 2016 his lifetime WAR was about 101.4. He LOST 1.8 career WAR over the 2017-2021 span. Pujols is 30th in career bWAR, 0.4 ahead of Joe Morgan and 0.3 behind Randy Johnson. Had he broken even in those 5 unfortunate seasons, rather than lose 1.8 WAR, he’d certainly have more homers now, too — enough to be well beyond 700 homers now, probably on course to catch and pass Babe Ruth.
OK. Enough free associating. I’ve reached a moral to this story: if you’ve got a good thing going in St. Louis, stay in St. Louis rather than go to crowded, smoggy Southern California for a few percentage points of additional income. Poor Pujols, who must now live with his decade of regret. And the Angels with theirs. Except the Angels don’t seem to have learned anything from the experience.
Oh, by the way:
- Thank you, Rosebuds, for putting together 11 innings of 1-run pitching to put a dent in the Seraphim’s weekly record. Eric Lauer did 5 scoreless — finally some consolation to the Wolverines for letting him slip away — and Julio Urias did 6 innings with just one earned run. Brother Luis Urias went 1 for 2 with a homer to save the team’s .160, .324, .400 offense from being merely replacement-level. All this good work, combined with a bit of an off-day in Salem (.172, .200, .176; no pitching), and a little grace from the Tornados ((2 ip, 3 er, and only 12 plate appearances’ worth of .250, .250, .333 hitting) helped the Wolverines sneak back to within a game of the Seraphim to maintain the illusion of a pennant race for another day.
- The Kangaroos retook third place yesterday. Jake Odorizzi (6 ip, 1 er) provided the fig leaf to cover the ‘Roos unsightly offense (.083, .214, .083 over 14 PA), but the biggest news was the Dragons finally coming a little way down from their stratospheric .911 raw winning percentage. Haviland’s Michael Kopech didn’t get anyone out while surrendering 4 earned runs, and Dragon hitters struggled to bat .219 with a .249 OBP. If it hadn’t been for homers from Aaron Judge and his little brother Daniel Vogelbach there would not have been a .500 team slugging percentage to lend the Dragon’s offense a bit of credibility.
- There’s a race a-brewing between the Rosebuds and the Alleghenys for 8th place. These two teams rank 1 – 2 in the league in terms of the damage suffered from head-to-head matchups, the Rosebuds losing 0.075 percentage points and the Alleghenys losing 0.065. (The Cascades have lost 0.064.). As of today the Alleghenys have crept to within striking range of the ‘Buds.