The Greatness of Pujols in a Steal

The events described occurred on April 24, 2009, at Busch Stadium, in a game pitting the Chicago Cubs versus the St. Louis Cardinals...

A smoky haze hung in the air of Busch Stadium as the Cardinal faithful uneasily sat in the type of silence that, without fail, follows a play that bodes ill for the hometown nine. For the first time in seemingly ages, that play was not a pitch by a reliever, but was an error. Ironically, the error was committed by Skip Schumaker, who was not manning his new home at the keystone, but patrolling his old haunts before the numbers of retired Cardinal legends in the safe pasture of the outfield grass. Schumaker had dropped a flyball, and a routine one at that. While ace Adam Wainwright, who had thrown like the emerging ace of last season for the first time in 2009 up to the seventh, had dug his own bases loaded jam, Skip's misplay had put Wainwright in the unenviable position of being surrounded by base-running Cubs, up a single run, without a single out. The cliché is that an ace, when faced with a daunting proposition such as this will "bear down" and "grind" his way out of the inning. Wainwright was up to the bearing and the grinding, inducing a double play which yielded two outs at the price of one run and the lead, followed by a pop out from the resurgent Fukudome. Wainwright had done it again, wriggling out of trouble with as minimal damage for which a red-blooded Cardinals fan could hope. But, the damage was done. Wainwright's first truly ace-like start of the season had seen its lead erased and the spectre of a "no decision" for our starter and, worse yet, another "loss" for the bullpen at the bats of the hated Northsiders was all too real.

It was less than a week ago that the bullpen did its best impression of the gut-wrenching 2008 relievers, surrendering two leads in the late innings of two consecutive games at Wrigley before Mother Nature mercifully doused the century-old baseball yard with a day's worth of rain on Sunday, delaying the fourth match-up of the young 2009 season until this, the following Friday. So it seemed that more late-inning heartbreak at the hands of the Cubbies was afoot in the form of Skip's dropped pop-out and the inevitable appearance of whichever reliever LaRussa would throw into the fire of a tie game. That reliever was hometown St. Louisan Kyle McClellan, whom the manager trusts with small leads in late innings, and it seemed that he would be the goat this early summer evening after he promptly surrendered a leadoff double to the free-swinging Alfonso Soriano, who was then moved to third base on a grittily intangible sacrifice bunt by the turncoat Chicago second baseman, Aaron Miles. However, the resourceful McClellan got Derek Lee to line out for the second out of the inning and struck out Mike Fontenot, preserving the tie. As the Cubs took the field, Cardinal Nation uneasily prepared itself for the bottom of the eighth.

Modern communication almost necessarily boils a message down to its very essence and the intermission between the visitors' and home team's halves of the eighth inning was no exception. My friend, a fellow lifelong Cardinals' devotee, texted me, "Ank, Pujols, Ludwick. It is now or never." And so it was. The Cubs were not going to make it easy for the heart of the St. Louis lineup as Lou Pineilla trotted out their bullpen ace, Carlos Marmol, with his nasty fastball/slider combination, to the mound with the hopes of preserving the tie.

Marmol quickly dispatched of Ankiel. The remade Cardinal center fielder flew out to his counterpart in blue on the third pitch he saw. As Marmol retrieved the ball from the cutoff man, the greatest Cardinals since Musial made the slow walk from the on-deck circle around to the right-handers' batters' box. The crowd erupted in the way that it does only for this man, este hombre. Pujols was at the bat and that is all the occupants of Busch could hope for late in a tie game. With one swing, Skip's error would be erased from our collective minds and the events of last weekend in the Windy City would be skirted. Pujols stood in, with the most-daunting stance in baseball, poised and ready to inflict violence on the baseball. Marmol's first slider missed for a ball. The second was a called strike. Then, Marmol went with a fastball away. Pujols pounced, stroking it back up the middle for a base hit. The Cardinal first baseman sprinted out of the box, taking a wide and aggressive turn around the bag in search of any bobble or misplay that might allow him to make a play for the scoring position of second base. However, the sure-gloved Reed Johnson did not oblige and Pujols, the go-ahead run, retreated back to first.

The crowd was growing frenzied as they welcomed the 2008 Silver Slugger to the bat. Marmol missed badly, low and away, on his first pitch. The reliever caught the ball from his battery mate and circled back to the rubber. Marmol took the sign, came set, and came to the plate. Seeming simultaneously with Marmol's slide step to the plate, Pujols broke for second, an occurrence that was immediately apparent from where we sat, below the second deck and along the right field line. "My Lord, he's stealing second," I yelled as I involuntarily stood up. The roughly 4.5 seconds seemed like an eternity with the play unfolding in slow motion like the climactic scene of a Hollywood movie. For those moments which felt like minutes, the great Pujols was in the original Busch as an El Birdo; he was Brock. He was sprinting across the Astroturf of Busch II, playing Whiteyball and channeling McGee and Coleman. As he was halfway between first and second, all those in attendance seemingly became aware of his attempted theft, standing and urging him toward his goal. Pujols slid, kicking up the infield dirt. Miles caught the throw. Pujols hit the bag. Miles tagged him. The umpire motioned, "Safe." The crowd exploded in delirium, celebrating this play fitting of '67 or '85. The 6'3", 230-pound slugging first baseman had just swiped second with the ease of a fleet-footed outfielder of Cardinals' clubs past.

It is fitting that Aaron Miles was at second, taking the throw and applying the tag on the stealing Pujols. It is Miles who is celebrated for his toughness and for playing the game right, giving it his all on every play. Yet, it is Pujols, more than any other Cardinal, who embodies the spirit of grit and embodies Larussa's "play a hard nine" philosophy. It was Pujols who scored from second base on a groundout last year in Colorado. It is Pujols who is known as "The Invisible Man" for his base-running prowess and ability to take the extra base. It is Pujols who is amongst the game's best defenders. And it is Pujols who manufactured the game-winning run against the deplored interdivision rival Chicago Cubs on April 24, 2009 by stealing second base.

The very next pitch to Ludwick was grounded up the middle, past a diving Ryan Theriot. Pujols continued his base-running clinic with an aggressive secondary lead which placed the grounder behind him. Upon contact, Pujols read that the ball was a grounder and he was off, digging for home with the same maximum effort that afforded him the prize of second base on the previous pitch. He was scoring all the way and would not be denied home or victory. Jose Oquendo obliged the MVP, waving him in for a 4-3 lead. In recognition of what they had just witnessed, the exuberance of the crowd in the wake of Pujols's steal was compounded by its resulting in the go-ahead run. Like Cubdom the week before at Wrigley, Cardinal Nation celebrated its club's late-inning, win-producing heroics with a deafening roar.

The non-anointed closer, Ryan Franklin, came in and closed out the win, which gave the clubs a .500, 2-2 record against one another for the season. As we were leaving the ballpark, my friend turned to me and, with a sobering look of seriousness, said, "He really is the greatest ballplayer in the world, the greatest I've ever seen..." trailing off in contemplation of what he had witnessed not just on this night, but on countless times before it. Little did we know he would add another such memory the following afternoon...