And he has never been the same since.

I agree....I bet he is cranking also, Independence and all.

If you're talking about Lidge...I'm going to go ahead and say he rebounded pretty nicely last year LMAO

If you are referring to Albert, it's because of his elbow. He keeps delaying that surgery for the elbow, which I think affects his game.

Its not like the Phillies won the World Series or anything.

It really doesn't mean much in the big picture.

The Royals have been a AAA ball club at best for the last 20 seasons.

The fans that aren't the brightest bunch are the Royals fans for putting up with that POS of an organization for all this time.

Yeah, that was kind of annoying. Lidge is a punk.

But So Taguchi got another ring, so that made up for it.

The night after that Home Run happened both teams had to fly back to St. Louis for the next game I have posted this before but a great story:


LMAO LMAO LMAO LMAO

Just 10 years ago Cardinals fans were toting McWire as the greatest in the game. Let's hope for another story book ending.

LMAO Until he puts up numbers consistenly year in and year out "Hanley" does not belong in the discussion. A couple more years like last year and sure, put him up there. What Pujols has done every year he's played puts him on top.

Yep... Pujols seems like a decent enough guy, but if he busted for doing roids or HGH I wouldn't be surprised at this point. The only player that would surprise me is Griffey JR.

Just so many things to say and no way to nicely sum up.

1) I'm guessing KCChiefs88 also finds Grantland Rice to be droll, Heinz to be prosaic and Woody Paige to be an icon. Joe Posnanski is an absolutely brilliant writer. Failing to recognize him as among the best, if not the absolute best, sportwriters in the country is a pretty damning indictment of the person suggesting he's anything other than elite. Rick Reilly is a vapid hack, Posnanski is everything a sportswriter oughta be.

2) TONS of sour grapes among the Royals fans. Albert just put up his best season at age 28, the age he is actually supposed to put up his best season. If he were 30/31, he'd be in his decline years. Instead he fought through a pretty painful elbow issue to author the finest season of his career, especially considering his supporting cast.

Will he age well? No, probably not. He has a pretty thick trunk and has had some nagging leg issues throughout his career. With as much power as he generates with his lower half, I think his raw power numbers will start to decline here in the next season or two. He'll continue to be a good doubles hitter and OBP machine, but somewhere near a 25 HR guy in the next 4 seasons. I'm thinking Todd Helton. Helton's power #s began a steep decline at age 28 after having his best season at 27. Funny that nobody's screaming steroids or accusing him of lying about his age. Hmmm.....

Albert's career arc has simply done what a historically great player's career arc should do. He had a great season in 2003, but it was clearly something of an outlier in his overal progression. Take away 2 HRS that season and his OPS+ is around 165, a slight tick over the previous 2 seasons and a notch below the next 3. He had an injury in 2007 that robbed him of a prime season but he still managed a great year. At age 28, he had his peak season. C'mon guys, that's exactly what he's SUPPOSED to do in his career arc. Nobody can argue that he's not one of the best hitters of the last 25 years. That level of ability comes with talent that simply sets him apart from other MLB players, so why is it so impossible to accept the fact that he's simply been a great player from the start?

3) I won't be a KU fan and claim that we don't care if STL wins the season series against KC. I absolutely hate it when we lose to you guys. However, I car far more about beating the Mets, Astros, Cubs, Brewers and Braves. I also care more about the results over 162 games...or 2 decades. Take your season series victory, I'll take my decade of sustained success, a couple of pennants and a WS title.

4) AL baseball sucks ass. The DH has done more to hurt the sport than 'roids, IMO. Baseball has always been about the chess pieces as much as the athleticism. The DH kills at least 1/2 the strategy and greatly damages part of what makes baseball great.

5) Manny covers the plate better than Albert. Manny's the best bad-ball hitter I've ever seen and likely the best I ever will. He doesn't have the focus Albert has, but Manny is a more talented hitter. Albert's better at keeping an inside fastball fair down the LF line, but Manny can take any ball within 8 inches of the zone in any direction and hit it hard. His lack of preparation will lead to him taking some akward swings and getting off balance(which Pujols never does), but I've seen him put a ball 425 feet while swinging off his front foot with one arm. Manny is possibly the most talented RH hitter of all time.

6) Lidge was the best reliever in baseball last season, I think he came back around nicely. He'll plummet to earth soon, however. The torque generated by his slider will eventually take its toll on his elbow. The Mets will learn this with K-Rod as well. If Lidge loses even a little bit of his slider, he's useless. He can't spot his fastball well enough to survive without an A+ slider.

7) Cardinals fans recognized McGwire for what he was. Most of us knew he was a steroid freak and a limited player. He had great power, a great batting eye and an underrated glove. Sure, there were the local fanboys and old women that came out to see him, but all fanbases have their bandwagon idiots. To say that the Cardinals fan in general held him out as 'the greatest ever' is another assinine strawman generated by folks just looking to knock down the next big thing.

dude if you were paying attention you would know most cardinal fans on here didn't think he was a true Cardinal and just a sideshow. Now, Pujols is considered by most Cardinal fans the inheritor of the legacy of Dizzy Dean, Stan the Man, Gibson, Brock and Ozzie.

Replace "Royals" with "Chiefs" and this sentence means the same thing.

2.) Tons of sour grapes from Royals fans? There was exactly one Royals fan, Great Expectations, a poster I've never seen before this thread. There were other posters, some Royals fans some not, that expressed doubts over Pujols' true age. But that's not sour grapes, that's legit concern. Posnanski's article is partly about that very issue.

6) Joakim Soria, with his .68 WHIP, disagrees.