DataBaseball
2026
Albert Pujols headshot

DH · 2022

Albert Pujols

Age
42
B/T
R/R
Height
6' 3"
Weight
235 lb
Number
#5
Born
January 16, 1980 in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
MLB debut
April 2, 2001
dbWAR
2.6
9 season(s)
PA
351
AVG
.270
OBP
.345
SLG
.550
wRC+
153
100 = avg

Albert Pujols is a designated hitter for the St. Louis Cardinals. In 2022 he hit 24 home runs and knocked in 68 RBIs, notching 83 hits across 351 plate appearances in 109 games. His batting average was .270, 11.4% higher than the league average of .243. He reached base at a .345 clip and slugged .550, for an OPS of .895, 26.7% higher than the league mark of .706 — the second best on his team, and 10th of 469 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 91.2 mph off the bat, hit 47.3% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 10.5% of them and made contact on 78.7% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 153 wRC+ puts his offence 53% above average. That comes to 2.2 dbWAR — +19.9 runs with the bat, -0.9 on the bases, -9.4 for the position he plays, against replacement level. It includes no fielding: defensive runs are proprietary and are not estimated here, so the figure credits playing a demanding position but not playing it well.

League context

Percentile among qualified batters, 2022.

wRC+153
wOBA.382
ISO.280
BB%8.0%
WAR2.2

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2022. These four terms sum to +21.2 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

Batting+19.9Baserunning-0.9Position-9.4Replacement+11.7
BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

2.20.3-1.61516171819202122

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
202210935183246812855.270.345.550.280.2528.0%15.7%.382+19.91532.2
202110729665175021445.236.284.433.196.2234.7%15.2%.303-3.6910.0
202039163346250925.224.270.395.171.2305.5%15.3%.283-5.472-0.4
2019131545120239334368.244.305.430.185.2387.9%12.5%.311-5.5920.1
2018117498114196412865.245.289.411.166.2475.6%13.1%.302-6.789-0.2
20171496361432310133793.241.286.386.145.2495.8%14.6%.288-19.476-1.6
20161526501593111944975.268.323.457.189.2607.5%11.5%.334+6.71121.1
2015157661147409555072.244.307.480.236.2177.6%10.9%.337+10.51191.7

Pitching

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2022101.0000340136.0032.114.000.09.0907809-0.3

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Batting by the hand the pitcher throws with, 2022. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHP13111440131019.351.405.746.47414.5%
vs RHP22019343111836.223.309.435.32716.4%
Opponent batting by the side the hitter bats from, 2022. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHB221100.500.5002.0001.0320.0%
vs RHB542110.500.6001.250.7310.0%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2022.

Loading 258 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 258 tracked batted balls in 2022. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
10.5%
27 barrels
Exit velocity
91.2
mph average
Max exit velo
111.7
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
47.3%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
34.5%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
16.4°
average
Barrel rate10.5%
Exit velocity91.2 mph
Hard hit rate47.3%
Contact rate78.7%

A barrel is a batted ball whose exit velocity and launch angle have historically produced at least a .500 average and 1.500 slugging — 98 mph within 26–30°, widening to 8–50° by 116 mph. Reconstructed from Statcast's published anchor points, which reproduces them exactly; the interior is within a degree. Sweet spot (8–32°) is an exact definition.

Hot and cold zones

Batting average by pitch location, 2022.

.000.240.115.245.33312 AB.33318 AB.41217 AB.10010 AB.50036 AB.30826 AB.21414 AB.30826 AB.18832 AB
Below averageLeague averageAbove average
Batting average by location of the pitch that ended each plate appearance, catcher's view. The bordered square is the strike zone; the outer band is chase territory. Cells with fewer than 8 at-bats are left grey rather than shown as signal. League average on the same attribution is .242.

Situational hitting

How Albert Pujols hits by base state, outs, score and late-game pressure — each read against his own season line.

Split by
By who is on base when he comes up. The season line is repeated as the baseline.
SituationPAABHHRRBIBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBA
All situations351.270.345.550.382
Bases empty1811564411111727.282.381.545.403
Runner on first807715410216.195.212.403.262
Runners on1701513913571128.258.306.556.359
RISP907424947912.324.389.716.447

Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Counted from play-by-play, 2022.

Pitch sequencing

What Albert Pujols throws in each count, and what he follows each pitch with. Select any cell for the breakdown.

ShowBatter
FastballCurveball

Select a count to see exactly what Albert Pujols throws in it.

Pitch arsenal

What he throws, how hard, and how often it misses in 2022.

Fastball70.4%1962.41,62742.1%0.0%
Albert Pujols's arsenal by usage. Velocity is average release speed in mph, spin in rpm, and whiff rate is misses per swing — the cleanest single measure of whether a pitch beats hitters.

Head to head

Put Albert Pujols beside up to three others.

Compare — add up to 3 more players
Albert Pujols

Similar players

Nearest 2022 seasons by discipline, contact, power and speed, on rate statistics rather than totals.

How these are computed

wOBA uses linear weights measured from this season's own play-by-play rather than published constants, and wRC+ is park-adjusted against that same league. dbWAR is our own open implementation — not fWAR or bWAR — and the full derivation, including its simplifications, is on the methodology page.