Cardinals graphic puts Albert Pujols’ career dominance into perspective

On the team broadcast, the St. Louis Cardinals showed a graphic that put Albert Pujols’ career dominance into perspective. Quite simply: Wow.

Throughout the last 12-18 months, Cardinals legends Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright have been dominating the spotlight with the amount of records being broken/about to be broken. While Albert Pujols has received some attention since returning to St. Louis, it hasn’t been as strong as his teammates.

But it should be – and a graphic that the Cardinals broadcast showed on Wednesday night put Pujols’ career numbers into perspective. Here’s where Pujols ranks in baseball history in five categories:

Games (3,002): 8th.

Hits (3,320): 9th.

Home Runs (683): 5th.

RBI (2165): 3rd.

Total Bases (6,075): 3rd.

Pujols, 42, is a surefire Hall of Famer and gives the Cardinals at least three Hall of Famers on their current roster (likely four if Nolan Arenado continues at his current pace). But seeing his number put into that context, especially among all players in baseball history, underscores just how impressive he was and how much he meant to the Cardinals.

Pujols’ two best seasons came in 2003 and 2008, respectively. In 2003, he posted a .359/.439/.667 slashline with 43 home runs, 212 hits, 51 doubles, 124 RBI and a 1.106 OPS. In 2008, he posted a .357/.462/.653 slashline with 37 home runs, 187 hits, 47 doubles, 116 RBI and a career-high 1.114 OPS.

There were 10 seasons that hovered around those numbers, which is absolutely wild to think about, and underscores just how dominant of a player that Pujols was in his prime. He isn’t that same player now, of course, but he’s still valuable and has routinely been seen helping the Cardinals’ young players on the field and behind the scenes.

Which makes his one-year contract look like an absolute bargain considering everything he brings to the table, both on the field and away from it.