One of the hardest feats to achieve in all of baseball is to win the Triple Crown award. The award consists of winning the batting, home run, and RBI titles in one season. This has happened only thirteen times since 1900. The last player to do it was Carl Yastrzemski for the Boston Red Sox back in 1967. Yastrzemski tallied a .344 avg., 44 home runs, and 121 RBI's.Albert Pujols is on his way in the first half of the year. So far Albert leads in home runs (30), RBI's (77) , and is fifth in batting average hitting .332. Albert is always up there in batting average and it is not a long shot for him to possibly win it. He is having a monster year so far, but will he win the triple crown?
The game has changed over the years, and I think that it is harder now to win the triple crown than ever before. To win the triple crown is more of a team effort. You have to have the supporting cast behind you to get on base to drive in those runs. RBI's, in my opinion is the hardest of the three. We all know Albert can hit, but actually getting pitchers to pitch to him with runners in scoring position is something that will not happen very often down the stretch. Anytime there are runners in scoring position with less than 2 outs, he will most likely get intentionally walked. We saw this when Bonds was in his prime, and we will start to see it more with Albert. Pitchers need to stop being afraid of hitters, and should pitch to record outs. Pitching around hitters is part of the game, but we will never see another triple crown winner until until managers and pitchers man up and challenge the hitters.
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I agree that it will be tough for Pujols to get a Triple Crown but that's not saying it can't happen. He is - by far - the best player in the game and he's just getting better. Inserting DeRosa into their lineup will only make his numbers better and I think he will go nuts in the 2nd half with home runs.
ReplyDeleteIf you replace batting average with .OBS, he would dominate that category even more.
RBI's are going to be tough to come by with a lot of Cards having terrible years(Ankiel, Duncan, Ludwick). But you figure he is already leading the league now, what happens if a few of those guys come around and get on base.. Don't sleep on Howard on that category, down 17 right now with Rollins never on base.
ReplyDeleteThe most amazing stat about Pujols is the HRs to K's ration. 30 HRS and 32 K's! Just to compare how different him and Howard are...20 HRS to 92K's. wow
Like I said in my last comment on The Morning After - I think Pujols will win the triple crown this year.
You meant .OPS right? On base% plus sluggling%? Yeah he is leading that by a good margin too. 1.197 to 1.034 over Prince
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