Dominican home runner Albert Pujols plans to report to the Los Angeles Angels training camp on Wednesday in Tempe, Arizona, where he will complete the process of preparing for the final season of a fabulous contract that could be the last of his legendary career in the United States. Major League Baseball.
Los Angeles will open its pitcher and receiver camp on Wednesday, but the rest of the players won’t have to report it until next Monday. However, the coronavirus health and safety protocol requires players to undergo screening tests and undergo a mandatory five-day home quarantine before entering the field.
With 41 years of age, multiple operations on different parts of his body, a record sink and a fortune in excess of $ 300 million, Pujols faces 2021 not as the end of the journey, but as a stop. who will decide the next destination.
“Right now, I don’t have a plan for the future,” Pujols told ESPN Digital on Tuesday.
“I’ve worked all winter to be ready from the first day of training. I’ll take this year day by day, without creating expectations. There are things that happen that one can’t control,” Pujols said.
“I will try not to think about the future, but about what I can do now for this organization. My body will dictate to me what to do next,” he added.
A 10-time All-Star with three Most Valuable Player Awards, Pujols could be guaranteed to have a plaque at the Cooperstown Hall of Fame at the end of his career. But the fifth-highest home runner-up and runner-up in major-league history, he doesn’t have a secure place right now in Joe Maddon’s lineup for the season that begins April 1.
In the season cut to 60 games last year – the penultimate of the 10-year contract and $ 240 million with Los Angeles – Pujols hit 224 with six homers and 25 RBIs in 152 innings. In the midst of a pandemic, Pujols had the worst percentages of OBP (270) and OPS (665) in his 20-year career.
Pujols’ brightest moments came on Sept. 13 at Coors Field in Colorado, when he connected on his 660 home run to tie with Willie Mays in the historic lead, and five days later, against the Texas Rangers in Anaheim, when he beat his last 2 flyers of the season, leaving Mays behind.
Now the only players to have hit more homers than Pujols (662) are Dominican Alex Rodriguez (696) and Americans Babe Ruth (714), Hank Aaron (755) and Barry Bonds (762). With 2,297 boosted runs, Aaron is the only one to have more than Pujols (2,100).
In September, in the second and final month of the campaign, Pujols was turned by Maddon into an occasional player who barely started in 14 of the 24 games in Los Angeles. With Jared Walsh installed at first base, it remains to be seen how many turns Maddon would guarantee Pujols in his final season.
“My body feels good. I haven’t visited an operating room recently and because of how short it was last season, I’m rested,” Pujols said.
“I’m going to training full of optimism, ready to contribute and focused on the things I can control. Then I’ll have time to think beyond 2021,” the player added.