photo: Albert Pujols (Gary A. Vasquez / USA TODAY Sports)
Albert Pujols completes a very successful award season with the National League’s Comeback Player of the Year Award, the St. Louis Cardinals’ 13th major honor for 2022. Our weekly history feature reviews all seven Cardinals Comeback winners.
Pujols named NL Comeback Player of the Year
Another week, another St. Louis Cardinal wins a national award. This past week the American and National Leagues Comeback Player of the Year Awards were announced. The NL honoree is designated hitter Albert Pujols.
This is the 12th major award won by a Cardinal in 2022. The list includes two Fielding Bible Awards, two Gold Gloves, one Platinum Glove, two Silver Sluggers, one NL Outstanding Player of the Year, one Hank Aaron Award, one Heart and Hustle award, one Most Valuable Player and this Comeback Player of the Year Award. In addition, the Cardinals received the team Gold Glove Award, rounding out this award season with a total of 13 honors.
The 42-year-old Pujols joins prior Cardinals winners of the Comeback Player of the Year, most recently Chris Carpenter (2009) and Lance Berkman (2011). The career accomplishments for the now retired Pujols is long, and includes three MVPs, six Silver Sluggers, two Gold Gloves and a Rookie of the Year.
Cardinals reliever Ryan Helsley received votes for the award, as did former Cardinal Matt Carpenter in the AL.
Hall of Fame Ballot for 2023 class released
On Monday, November 21, the ballot for the 2023 Baseball Hall of Fame class was released. The 28 names include 14 returnees and 14 appearing for the first time. Of these 28 names, four are former Cardinals.
One of the returning ex-players is third baseman Scott Rolen, who appears for the sixth year. Players remain on the ballot for up to 10 years. Rolen, who was with St. Louis from 2002-2007, continues to gain steam for eventual induction, having climbed to 63.2 percent of the votes on last year’s ballot.
A player must receive at least 75% of the vote to be inducted, so Rolen is very close and is likely to reach the needed 75% very soon, possibly this year. The logjam of big names on the ballot in the past, which included some known or suspected steroid users, has lessened. Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Curt Schilling are among those no longer on the ballot.
Three former Cardinals appear on the ballot for the first time. They are Carlos Beltran, John Lackey, and Jhonny Peralta. Of the three, Beltran is the one most likely to garner the most votes and begin down the path toward eventual induction.
A player must receive at least 5% of the total vote to stay on the ballot for another year. Voting by Baseball Writers’ Association of America members continues through December 31. Winners will be announced on January 24, 2023, for induction next July.
Trade and Acquisition Rumors
There are no new trade or acquisition rumors to report.
Transactions
There are no transactions to report.
Injury Report
There are no new injuries to report.
Looking Ahead
The 2022-23 offseason has begun, and all unsigned eligible free agents have elected free agency.
The Cardinals finalized the 40-man roster in preparation for the Rule 5 draft, scheduled for December 7. Outfielder Moises Gomez and LHP Connor Thomas were added to the roster.
The deadline for tendering contracts to all unsigned players has passed. The Cardinals declined to offer contracts to RHP Alex Reyes and CF Ben DeLuzio. Both players are now free agents.
The next event on the offseason agenda is the annual Winter Meetings. These meetings are scheduled to take place from December 4-7 in San Diego. The Winter Meetings are a key period during which teams explore and make deals for players, either in trade or free agency. The final day of the meetings are when the Rule 5 draft takes place.
Other dates on the offseason calendar involving the Baseball Hall of Fame take place in November and December. On November 21 the BBWAA Hall of Fame ballot was released. Members of the BBWAA have until December 31 to fill out and return their ballot.
In addition, on December 4, the Contemporary Baseball Era Committee will meet, and the results of that voting will be announced live on MLB Network at 7 pm CT. On December 6 and 7 the recipients of the 2023 Ford C. Frick Award for broadcasters, and the BBWAA Career Excellence Award for writers will be announced.
Blast from the Past
In a continuation of the theme of offseason awards, this week’s Blast takes a look at the Comeback Player of the Year Award. The NL winner for 2022 is Albert Pujols, in acknowledgment of his achievements with the Cardinals in his final season in major league baseball.
This segment will cover the history of this award and all Cardinal recipients of the award since its inception.
The Comeback Player of the Year Award began in 1965 and was awarded by The Sporting News from 1965 through 2006. It was given to one player in each league who was once a star, but because of injury or ineffectiveness had to reclaim his star status.
In 2005 Major League Baseball began its own Comeback Players of the Year. The Sporting News discontinued its awards in 2006 but there were two seasons of overlap. The winners of the awards by both entities in both seasons were the same, however.
Players could win multiple times, and indeed one Cardinal did just that. It was also given out posthumously in 2016 to the Marlins Jose Fernandez, who was tragically killed in a boating accident several months earlier that year.
From 1965 to 2006, four Cardinals were named the NL Comeback Player of the Year. The first winner was Lou Brock in 1979. Brock had the worst offensive season of his Cardinals career in 1978. He came back as the 1979 Player of the Month in May. He was named to the All-Star Game that season and collected his 3000th hit against the Cubs on August 13. Like Pujols, Brock won the Comeback Player of the Year award in his final season in baseball.
In 1984, Joaquin Andujar received the award. Following a 1983 season in which the right-handed pitcher had a record of 6-16 and an ERA of 4.61, Andujar logged 20 wins with an ERA of 3.34 in 1984.
In his second stint with the Cardinals, pitcher John Tudor was the NL Comeback Player of the Year in 1990. Tudor was traded to the Dodgers in 1988 and missed 1989 with an elbow injury. The Cardinals signed him as a free agent for 1990, and Tudor came back from injury to win 12 games and post an ERA of 2.40. Like Brock and Pujols, Tudor won the award in his final season as an active player.
The final Cardinal winner of The Sporting News NL Comeback Player of the Year was Chris Carpenter in 2004. The right-handed pitcher came back from injury in both 2002 and 2003 to win the award with a 15-5 season and an ERA of 3.46.
Carpenter was also the next Cardinal winner of the award once it was taken over by Major League Baseball. Carpenter is the only multiple Cardinal to receive the award, taking it again in 2009. Carpenter suffered again from elbow issues that kept him from playing in nearly all of two seasons, 2007 and 2008. Carpenter bounced back in 2009 to finish second in the Cy Young voting, an award he had won in 2005. Carpenter led the NL in ERA with 2.14 and won 17 games that season.
After 12 seasons with the Astros, Lance Berkman was traded to the Yankees in 2010 and underwhelmed in his short time there. The Cardinals signed him as a free agent in December 2010 and he thrived in 2011, slashing .301/.412/.547 and helping the Cardinals to win their 11th World Series Championship. Berkman in turn won the NL Comeback Player of the Year Award.
Berkman was the last Cardinal Comeback Player of the Year until Pujols in 2022. Pujols returned to play his final season with the team with which he began his career and made his mark. He hit 24 home runs in 2022 and reached the 700-home run milestone against the Dodgers in Los Angeles in the final month of the season. His magical 2022 season will likely never be forgotten by Cardinals fans. His NL Comeback Player of the Year Award was very deserved.
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