Rise of The Machine: An Albert Pujols Update

One of my first posts of the baseball season was a look at Albert Pujols' home run drought. It took a grand total of like three days for Pujols to make me look foolish.

At the time, I used FanGraphs' player page to point out that Pujols was swinging at more pitches outside the strike zone -- from a career number of 21% up to 41%. Here's what I concluded:

Pujols just signed a $240 million contract, might be (understandably) feeling the pressure to earn that contract in a new city, and is pressing, going after pitches he normally would lay off, causing more strikeouts when he misses and a little weaker contact even when he connects.

Since that time, Pujols has seen 388 pitches out of the strike zone, and swung at 33% of them, right in line with last season's numbers. And wouldn't you know it: Pujols has hit 14 home runs in the last two months. That's a home run in 5.4% of those 261 plate appearances, closer to his career rate of 6%. It's also worth pointing out that Pujols' HR/FB rate over that time is 16.9%, a bit below his career rate of 19%. That means you should expect more home runs in the second half.

...I mean, uh, ALBERT PUJOLS IS AWESOME AT BASEBALL

"That one's for you, Bryan." (via)
I typed up my most recent article, investigating the causes behind Albert Pujols' home run drought, with a growing sense of dread. Visions of Pujols homering in his first at bat Thursday night hung over my frantic analysis like some baseball bat of Damocles. I watched Thursday and Friday's games with bated breath.

Considering the power Pujols has displayed throughout his career, the fact that he made it until Sunday afternoon was as good as I could have hoped for. Plus, now I get to write an easy follow-up post whining about my miserable luck*.

After the home run, Keith Law tweeted that he couldn't wait for the whiplash-incuding speed with which the narrative on Pujols would change. As a free service to those busy producers of the talking head panel shows on ESPN, we here at The Feats of Strength wish to provide a general recipe for a ready-made Albert Pujols discussion.

We're So Sorry, Uncle Albert

Albert Pujols would be very happy if we all just forgot about the last month of baseball.

Pujols signed a 10-year, $240M contract over the winter with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim*. The statistically-minded balked at the deal, which would pay him $30m in 2021, when Pujols will be 41 years old. Still, it wasn't hard to imagine that the deal could still be worthwhile, so long as Pujols crushed in the first half of the deal.

...Whoops. Pujols, projected by FanGraphs to hit 28 home runs this season, is still waiting for his first homer some 107 plate appearances into the season. That's the longest drought of the season, and naturally, everyone's asking, "What's wrong with The Machine?"