St. Louis Cardinals slugger Albert Pujols is among the hottest players in MLB right now.
He is slashing .425/.477/1.000 with seven home runs and 14 RBI in his last 15 games.
Most recently, he hit an opposite-field homer on Monday, to reach 15 on the season and 694 for his career.
The most amazing part of it all is that he is doing it at 42 years old.
Pujols is on his final season, and he is trying to become just the fourth player in the history of the game to hit at least 700 home runs.
He needs six more from this point until the end of the regular season, and while it’s certainly possible, he is not playing every day.
Pujols Is Feasting On Left-Handed Pitchers In His Quest For History
Pujols’ playing time at this point comes mostly against left-handed pitchers.
This is not a coincidence: he is really bad against righties (.627 OPS), but extremely dangerous while hitting against southpaws (1.231 OPS).
This is not uncommon at all: right-handed hitters often perform better against lefties, mostly because they can pick up the ball in the pitcher’s hand easier than the opposite case.
Pujols, as a result, is feasting vs. lefties.
He has been so good that there is no reason why smart teams should let their faces face Pujols.
“Absolutely no team should be letting their left-handed pitchers pitch to Albert Pujols right now…but I’m so glad they are! 37 total bases in his last 25 ABs against lefties!” Codify Baseball tweeted about the slugger’s success against southpaws.
Absolutely no team should be letting their left-handed pitchers pitch to Albert Pujols right now…but I'm so glad they are!
37 total bases in his last 25 ABs against lefties! 🔥🔥🔥
👍 @PujolsFive pic.twitter.com/9JXhmE0PMm— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) August 30, 2022
Baseball fans are surely hoping that managers don’t start intentionally walking Pujols every time he faces a lefty, because we all want to witness history being made.
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