Albert Pujols: A superstar on and off the field
We're going to tell you about one of the best baseball players who ever lived - Albert Pujols, first baseman for the St. Louis Cardinals.
This is what he has done in his first ten years in the Major Leagues: he has never hit below .300, he has never hit fewer than 30 home runs and he has never knocked in fewer than 100 runs. No one in the history of Major League Baseball has ever done that in their first ten seasons - not Babe Ruth, not Joe DiMaggio, not Ted Williams.
On the road with Albert Pujols
Producer Draggan Mihailovich takes you behind the scenes with slugger Albert Pujols, perhaps the best player in baseball history.
As Bob Simon first reported last spring, Pujols, a native of the Dominican Republic, is now the idol in the baseball-crazy city of St. Louis. But what we found most impressive about Albert can't be found between the lines of chalk on a baseball field, as we discovered one night in St. Louis at an event where you would not expect to see the game's superstar.
Last October, they rolled out the red carpet for a gala. But the guest of honor was not Pujols. This was a night for teenagers with Down syndrome, there for an annual prom put on by the Pujols Family Foundation.
And when Pujols and his wife Deidre arrived, that's when the party really began.
"They're not only dancing. They're dressed to the hilt, aren't they? Guys in tuxedos," correspondent Bob Simon observed.
"Yeah," Pujols said, smiling broadly. "Tuxedo, nice, nice dress. It's almost like they wanna go all night long until the next day. They don't want the night to be over, you know?"
And neither did Pujols: every kid wanted to dance with him, and he never said no. By the end of the evening, he looked like he had just finished a doubleheader in August.
Extra: Will Pujols stay with the Cardinals?
Extra: What makes Pujols a great hitter?
Extra: Pujols, ten years later
"Must be the highlight of the year for them," Simon remarked.
"Yeah. And for me too. I mean, any time I'm around them, I enjoy them and have a great time," he said.
Deidre's daughter Isabella is the reason Pujols got involved with Down syndrome.
Pujols emigrated to America from the Dominican Republic when he was 16; he met Deidre in Kansas City two years later. Right away, she told him she had an infant daughter, Isabella, who had Down syndrome.
"And I think he was like, almost in tears. Like, he just felt bad, because, you know, when you look at a child who isn't quite what the rest of the world would expect, it can be heartbreaking, but he didn't care," she remembered.
"When Deidre first told you, you didn't hesitate?" Simon asked.
"No, I say never in my mind cross and say, 'Oh, man, I probably stay away,' you know? No," Pujols said.
Pujols was still in high school. "I was still in school, I was the babysitter. And I love to be around her, and those are memories, you know, that you will never forget," he said.
Pujols told Simon he considers Isabella his daughter. "She's my little girl, my big girl right now, you know, she's 13 years old. And you know, she's normal to us. She can do anything," he said.
It was in high school in Kansas City that Pujols realized he could do anything, too: he could bash baseballs like no one else.
"Back then, in high school, were pitchers already afraid to throw good balls at you?" Simon asked.
"Yeah," Pujols replied.
He is so proud of his school career, he wanted us to look at his scrapbook - here was a player who could expect to be picked in the first few rounds of the 1999 Major League draft.
But it didn't happen.
"I mean, the rounds were going by and he still hadn't gotten picked. And when he got the call that, that he had gotten drafted in the 13th round, he was devastated, and he cried like a baby. And he was heartbroken," Deidre remembered.
Four hundred and one players were selected ahead of Pujols. "I was crying and, you know, I wanted to quit baseball," he told Simon.
It was the St. Louis Cardinals who gave him a reluctant nod and a small signing bonus. They sent him to their franchise in Peoria, Ill., a minor team in a minor league.
"When I was in Peoria for four and a half months, I got paid $252 with 50 cents," Pujols remembered.
That was his paycheck every two weeks. Deidre kept supporting him, but they were drowning in debt. "There were times we'd have these conversations, I think I need to file for bankruptcy. I don't know how I'll ever get this paid off. And Albert was like, 'No, don't do it yet.' His, his exact words were, 'Let's see what happens with my baseball,'" she remembered.
Produced by Draggan MihailovichWhat happened was this: he went on a tear in Peoria, and amazingly, after only one year in the minors, he made it to the St. Louis Cardinals. He was in the big leagues.
It took him all of four games before he hit his first home run. He came out swinging and hasn't stopped since.
We asked his teammate Lance Berkman to explain something we did not understand: "Why would any pitcher pitch to him?" Simon asked.
"In situations where the game is on the line, I would never pitch to him," Berkman said.
"He must love it when the bases are loaded," Simon joked.
"I still wouldn't pitch to him," Berkman said. "I mean, I'd rather walk in a run than give up four."
Pujols will tell you it's not just talent - it's work. He estimates he takes 15-to 20,000 practice swings a year.
What drives Pujols? He says he's still seething about how he was snubbed in that 1999 draft. He told Simon he'll "never" get over it.
"People have told me that it's a really bad idea to get you angry," Simon said.
"Yeah, you don't wanna do that," Pujols replied, laughing. "Yeah, you don't want me to go 0 for 4 either, because the next day, whoever's pitching is gonna pay up, you know?"
Peter Gammons, perhaps the dean of all baseball writers, has been covering the sport for 40 years. "If you look at history, there is no doubt that he's in the top ten players of all time," he told Simon.
"He's 31 years old, and he already belongs in the pantheon of the greatest," Simon remarked.
"Absolutely. I mean, he is, there's no question that he's going to be a Hall of Famer," Gammons predicted.
"Do you ever think back, 'Gee, I started out as a kid from the Dominican Republic. Look what's happened to me, I don't believe it,'?" Simon asked.
"Yeah. I think about it all the time. When I'm in the hotel by myself and I pinch myself some time. 'Wow, this (is) really me,' you know?" Pujols said.
And every year he goes back to where he came from: a poor suburb of Santo Domingo, where he started playing ball.
His aunt helped raise him, while his dad toured the country playing softball.
Last November, Pujols organized his own softball tournament on a familiar field, where he's just one of the boys. Well, almost.
But the real reason for the trip was not softball. Pujols and his wife regularly go to what are called "bateys," or shantytowns, to help people who really need help.
"What's the biggest need in a batey like this?" Simon asked, while they toured a neighborhood.
"Everything. I mean, you're talking about clothes, shoes, I mean, anything that you just throw it away in the United States, throw in the trash, it's almost like gold to these people, brand-new stuff, you know," Pujols explained.
Their family foundation has sent American doctors to a place where not long ago witch doctors held sway. The foundation recently brought new mattresses to a batey where kids often slept four at a time on waterlogged beds.
"Beds that you don't even want your dog or, or your cat or any pet that you have to sleep and, and it was pretty bad shape," Pujols said.
Pujols wants to expand the foundation's work to more bateys around the country; another medical mission is planned for this September.
He and Deidre were on hand to dedicate a new baseball field in the batey that the foundation funded. Pujols then spent three hours giving a clinic to boys who want to be him.
"Here you are in a pretty messy place. Why do you do it?" Simon asked.
"'Cause it's my passion. And I believe this is what God is calling me to do, you know. That was me. I mean, 20 years, 25 years ago, I was one of those little boys with no hope, you know, just a dream. This is not just so I can be Mr. Nice Guy. 'Look at that baseball player, you know, he's not just a superstar in the field, but off the field doing this.' I don't, I can care less," Pujols replied.
"You don't care what people think about you?" Simon asked.
"No, not really," Pujols said.
He says his devotion comes right out of his religion. He is devout, and as straight-laced as they come in baseball.
He told Simon he doesn't smoke or drink. When asked if he curses, he admitted, laughing, "Once in awhile."
Baseball has lost some of its allure over the last decade because of steroids. And more than a few people look at Pujols and ask: can he be that good and totally clean?
But he's never failed a drug test and has said he's willing to be tested every day. He stands by that statement.
"Given what's happened to baseball in the public's mind over the last several years, how important is Albert to the game?" Simon asked Peter Gammons.
"He's really important as the face of baseball. And he is the primary face. We're looking at history. He's an icon. And we should appreciate it because there's never been anything that's stained his reputation," he replied.
Pujols is as much a part of St. Louis now as the Gateway Arch. He says he wants to be a Cardinal forever, but even though he's making $16 million this year, he is not among the 20 highest paid players in baseball and that rankles him.
His contract's up at the end of the season. He won't even discuss it now.
Last August, he hit his 400th career home run. That put him in a very exclusive club.
He's kept that ball, along with a few other things in his basement, in a room teeming with trophies, mementos and awards. But the bat he had used for number 400? It isn't there. Why not?
Last August 31, the Cardinals were shut out by the Houston Astros at the end of a brutal road trip. Late that night, Pujols quietly left Houston's ball park and went to the Texas Children's Hospital. He had heard a boy was there who couldn't make it to the game because he had a malignant brain tumor.
Pujols came with a gift for 13-year-old Brandon Johnson: it was the bat that had whacked that 400th homer five nights earlier. He signed it, said a prayer and stayed for an hour.
Brandon is still with us, and the bat is still with him. He hangs on to it the way he hangs on to life. Because of surgery, it's not easy for him to express what that visit and that bat mean to him.
"Do you remember how you felt when he walked in?" Simon asked.
"I got real happy," Brandon remembered.
Pujols did not come to see Brandon with a gaggle of photographers. It was not a publicity stunt.
Albert Pujols has shown us many things since he came to America. Becoming a great baseball player is only one of them.