Friday, April 24, 2009

The Perfect Player

Yesterday, Albert Pujols destroyed Mets pitching. Pujols hit two home runs, drove in four runs, scored four runs, and got on base four times. Performances like this have become commonplace for Pujols, who is one of the best players in all of baseball.

Obviously, Cardinals manager has many reasons to gush over his star first baseman. Without Pujols, the Cardinals are toast. But perhaps LaRussa's opinion of Pujols is even further elevated than I originally thought.

"Perfect player, in my opinion," manager Tony La Russa said. "We're lucky to
have him, believe me."
Pujols is a phenomenal player and probably the best hitter in baseball today. But by no means is he the perfect player because well, that's an impossible title.

Even in the face of impossibility, I thought it'd be interesting to create the "perfect player" using the various skills and talents of the best current ball players.

Here is my "perfect ballplayer", loaded with tons of intangibles:

SPEED: Jose Reyes
POWER: Adam Dunn
SWING: Albert Pujols
LEADERSHIP: Derek Jeter
HEART: Aaron Rowand
HUSTLE: Dustin Pedroia
ARM STRENGTH: Rick Ankiel
RAW TALENT: Josh Hamilton
DEFENSE: Torii Hunter
CLUTCH: David Oritz

Combine all those talents into one player, and that my friends, would be an amazing position player. I would pay big bucks to watch this guy play.

What makes up your "perfect player"? (position players only!)

Discuss in the comments.

6 comments:

Bill said...

Fun idea!

But David Ortiz has hit .183 in his last 53 postseason at bats. I'm just sayin'.

SPEED: Jose Reyes
POWER: Albert Pujols
SWING: Albert Pujols
LEADERSHIP: who knows?
HEART: no idea, but Josh Hamilton would probably make a good case
HUSTLE: almost anyone in MLB except maybe Manny
ARM STRENGTH: Rick Ankiel
RAW TALENT: Albert Pujols
DEFENSE: Carlos Beltran or Chase Utley...though if you're looking for the perfect 1B, Pujols again
CLUTCH: don't really believe in it

So, no, not perfect, but I think Pujols comes about as close as a human ever will. :)

the-daily-something.blogspot.com

Anonymous said...

Yes, Beltran and Utley are far superior defensively to Hunter. Ichiro is also much better than Hunter.

Jorge Says No! said...

I've honestly never been that impressed with Utley's defense

Zach Sanders said...

Speed: Jose Reyes
Power: Russell Branyan
Swing: Ken Griffey Jr (back in the day)
Leadership: Mike Sweeney
Heart: Aaron Rowand
Hustle: Aaron Rowand
Arm Strength: Rick Ankiel
Defense: Adrian Beltre
Clutch: Garret Anderson (even though I don't really believe in clutch, I'll play along)

Jorge Says No! said...

Zach:

love the choice of Russell Branyan...that dude is ALL power.

Anonymous said...

What's this "one of the best players" nonsense? Is there any doubt left that he's simply the best player in baseball? What more does he have to do to get this recognition?