St. Louis Cardinals future Hall of Famer Albert Pujols recently revealed one crucial lesson that former manager Tony La Russa taught him at a young age, per Audacy. Pujols revealed that the piece of advice from La Russa stemmed from 2001, which happened to be his rookie season. La Russa was managing in St. Louis at the time.
“He (La Russa) asked me ‘So Albert, I’m going to tell you something. What do you prefer: 30 home runs or hit .300?’ And I was like ‘30 home runs, Tony. Everybody wants to hit the ball out of the ballpark.’ Bzzzz. Rookie mistake. ‘I want you to focus on hitting .300. Because if you focus on hitting .300, I bet you you’re going to get your 30 home runs. I bet you you’re going to get your 100 RBI.’ And that was the case.”
Albert Pujols is correct in his assessment that almost everybody wants to hit home runs. But baseball-minded people, such as Tony La Russa, understand that home runs will come with patience. Becoming a good all-around hitter is the key for long-term success. And Pujols, who is on the verge of reaching the 700-home run mark for his career, has certainly seen long-term success. His .296 career batting average shows that he took La Russa's advice to heart.
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Albert Pujols later commented on how La Russa's advice helped him and his relationship with the former Cardinals' head coach.
“He never gave me the opportunity to think about the question that he was giving me,” Pujols said. “But if you look at it, if you really focus on hitting .300, how many chances are you going to have with men in scoring position and chance to drive runs and do some damage? A lot. You’re going to get more hits. You’re going to hit .300.”
“Our relationship is like a father and son, 23 years later. And our relationship back then in 2001, I felt it hasn’t changed. If anything it’s getting stronger and stronger every year.”
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