Quotebook: The House that Albert Built

I think we're seeing something special. The funny thing about it is if he doesn't come through one time, you know you don't give him another shot that game.

-- David Eckstein

You just can't believe the numbers that you see up there. Everybody expects it and he continues to do it and that's what makes it amazing.

-- Chris Carpenter

The Great Pujols now has 13 home runs at Busch III, which is more than all of the rest of the team combined at the new park:

NAME	HR
Albert Pujols	13
Jim Edmonds	3
Juan Encarnacion	3
Scott Rolen	2
Scott Spiezio	2
Mark Mulder	1
Hector Luna	1
Non-Albert	12

I think it's safe to call it The House that Albert Built.

Hottest man on the planet with somebody in scoring position. At first, it looked like it wasn't going to go out and then I think the God of baseball grabbed it and pushed it out.

-- Houston manager Phil Garner

If there is such a thing as clutch hitting, Albert is certainly one of the game's foremost practicioners of it. Garner either reads his stats or knows intuitively (or both) that Albert is to be feared with runners on:

RK	Runners On	TEAM	OPS
1	Albert Pujols	StL	1.378
2	Bobby Abreu	Phi	1.179
3	Miguel Cabrera	Fla	1.141
4	Josh Willingham	Fla	1.082
5	Morgan Ensberg	Hou	1.056

RK	Runners in Scoring Po.	TEAM	OPS
1	Albert Pujols	StL	1.686
2	Moises Alou	SF	1.336
3	Lance Berkman	Hou	1.307
4	Barry Bonds	SF	1.266
5	Ken Griffey Jr.	Cin	1.233

And if there were a God of baseball, you can bet he'd have a goatee and wear #5.

And you could do some analysis on those 64 and you would probably find that not too many of them came when were far ahead or when we were far behind. They've been so clutch. ... It's because he's pure concentration. He separates every at-bat. He got beat by Oswalt, tips his cap to him and got ready for the next AB.

-- TLR

He's been so clutch. I don't even know how to describe it. ... He just gets a good pitch to hit and gets a good swing.

-- TLR

Tony, allow us to introduce you to WPA%. In the 22 games this season in which Albert has hit a homer, the Cardinals have gone 18-4. Nothing surprising there. But when we look at Albert's game-by-game WPA%, we see how much of an impact he's making: In the four games the team lost (in blue), Albert had a minimal or negative impact on the game:

• 4/18: -2.0%
• 4/28: -0.3%
• 5/3: -5.7%
• 5/28: 8.1%

But for the most part, when Albert homers, those hits make the difference in the game. It's not proof of clutchness, but it does prove the importance of the timing of Albert's circuit clouts.

There were a couple plays that if anything different happened, there is a good chance we don't win the game. One of them is John falling behind a tough lefty. He fouled off a couple of pitches and managed to draw the walk.

-- TLR

JRod and Albert remind me just a bit of the Hall of Fame Waner brothers, Lloyd "Little Poison" and Paul "Big Poison." Albert is big poison, and JRod is little poison, drawing the walks and clunking out base hits that set up the headline-grabbing home runs. With both JRod and Spiezio producing, when will TLR realize that their playing time doesn't have to be mutually exclusive? Let's see JRod and Spiezio in the corners, and give Juancarnacion some pine time. Marquiet?

Jason was throwing high sinkers that were getting away from him. He threw very, very few pitches below the waist the first three or four innings.

-- TLR

This was probably my worst one [of my last four] in terms of mechanics and location and my best in terms of keeping composure and staying under control.

-- Marquis

I was effectively wild if you want to use that term and made some pitches when I needed to.

-- Marquis

And yet it was his second-best Game Score all season and the second-best outing in his last eight in terms of Quietude (Q), my little pet metric for finesse pitchers. In honor of his "effective wildness," I added an HBP weight to the equation:

DATE	IP	H	HR	HBP	BB	SO	GB	FB	G/F	GS	Q
5/29/06	7.0	3	0	3	2	2	9	10	0.9	67	59.5
5/23/06	8.3	6	1	0	1	3	14	8	1.8	53	61.6
5/18/06	7.7	4	2	0	2	1	8	14	0.6	58	51.4
5/13/06	7.0	3	1	0	4	1	10	10	1.0	64	53.0
5/8/06	6.0	10	2	2	3	0	8	9	0.9	25	37.2
5/3/06	5.7	8	0	0	4	3	6	8	0.8	32	45.9
4/28/06	5.0	8	2	1	4	3	7	6	1.2	22	31.8
4/23/06	6.0	7	2	1	2	2	13	4	3.3	36	48.0
4/17/06	8.0	3	0	0	1	2	11	11	1.0	73	68.0
4/12/06	6.0	7	1	0	0	5	10	2	5.0	51	61.0
4/6/06	5.3	5	0	0	3	5	6	5	1.2	52	48.9

And speaking of wildness, I'm sorry, Jason, but finesse pitchers aren't "effectively wild." Randy Johnson, maybe, but not you. With Marquis's string of acceptable performances, could it be that he's unwittingly fattening himself up for a trade? It's probably unlikely now, with Carpenter on the shelf, but the question is going to persist into the summer on Marquis's peak trade value.