Last week, I wrote about how Cardinals legend Albert Pujols was brought up in the Eric Kay trial. An ex-Angels club employee allegedly had videos of Pujols making Kay do dares such as being hit on the knee with a 90-mph fastball. The former employee also testified that Pujols was paying kay to do the dares so that he could buy drugs for himself and the team.
Of course, Tyler Skaggs died of an overdose after being supplied drugs from Kay, and Kay is now serving 22 years in prison, while Skaggs’ family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit.
I gave my opinion and the matter, and sure enough, so did people in the comments. I saw that people were very unhappy with my take on the situation, and the post was ultimately taken down. But people seemed confused about the point I was trying to convey, and today, I’d like to clear the air on what I was trying to say.
I recognize that people weren’t happy with my opinion and that’s fine. I’ll wear it. But I think now is a good time to clear up any confusion.
Firstly, I want to say that all of this is speculation at this point. We don’t know if the claims about Pujols are true. It’s all hearsay at the moment, and until we know more, it’s okay to give Pujols the benefit of the doubt, and I think we should reserve our judgement until more information comes out, if it comes out.
We all know and love Pujols from his 12 seasons in St. Louis where he had some truly magical moments. He hit a towering home run off Brad Lidge to save the Cardinals from elimination in the NLCS, hit three home runs in a World Series game and hit his 700th career blast in his final season. We also know that Pujols has put in a lot of work off the field as a humanitarian and has devoted his time to some very good causes.
A lot of people seemed to think I was implying that Pujols was for sure guilty and responsible for the death of Skaggs. Let me be the first to say, I was not implying that at all. I was not trying to say that I thought Pujols was a bad person, and I don’t think that Skaggs’ death is his fault.
Even if this stuff is true, since we know Pujols isn’t the one responsible, he should be safe from any legal trouble, and I certainly believe he deserves to be safe from any legal trouble.
Pujols was my favorite player on the Cardinals for a long time, and I have nothing but the utmost respect for him as a player and as a person. He means so much to the Cardinals, the fanbase, the city of St. Louis and the entire baseball world. Never would I try to diminish that or smear his reputation. He gave me some very special memories as a fan.
Again, I was not trying to implicate the future Hall of Famer in any way, shape or form. I was not trying to say that he was guilty of what happened. All I was saying was that if, and only if, the stuff about him paying Kay to do dares for money to buy drugs is true, it’s disappointing.
And we don’t know that it’s true, and like I said in my past story, I think we shouldn’t jump to conclusions about his alleged involvement in these behaviors just yet. We don’t know the full story, so for now, nobody’s opinion on the Cardinals legend should change. I never once said in my story that it was for sure true, and I would caution anybody to not rush to judgment about the 11-time All-Star and three-time MVP.
But I do stand by my statement that if what is being said about him is true, then that is very childish behavior. Obviously, no human is perfect. We all make mistakes. I’m not saying Albert made a mistake, but if it is true, that behavior seems very unbefitting of a guy like him who has always been the epitome of class and hard work.
I’m not at all saying that he isn’t still that guy. You can’t take away everything he’s done for baseball and for society. I do believe that he is a good man at heart. But that doesn’t mean I agree with him allegedly taking part in these dares that have been talked about.
I named a couple other players that I couldn’t picture doing that, and I’ll name a few more. I wouldn’t expect that from Yadier Molina, Ozzie Smith, Bob Gibson or Lou Brock, and I certainly wouldn’t expect it from Pujols either.
Again, I know my opinion upset some people, and like I said, I’ll wear it. But I’m not going to be upset with people for sharing their opinions. In fact, that’s a big part of what makes the Cardinals fanbase so amazing. We all have different opinions. We’re not all going to agree all the time, and that’s okay. That’s why we discuss things and share what we think about anything pertaining to Cardinals baseball. But I would hope everybody understands that I’m not here to try and smear Pujols or accuse him of anything. I don’t want to suggest that he isn’t a good person, because I believe he is a good person.
It would just be very disappointing to me, and probably a lot Cardinals fans if this stuff turns out to be true. Then again, as I said last week, I still think we should reserve our judgement until we know more, and we don’t at the present moment. It’s all just speculation right now, and that was all I was trying to do, not write a hit-piece on one of the greatest Cardinals of all time.