'Pujols won't find unconditional love anywhere else,' Vecsey

10/27/11, George Vecsey, "It will never be easier for Pujols to be the person he is — which includes private, taciturn, perhaps even distant — than in this city, which adores its heroes. St. Louis never demanded that Stan Musial be anything more than the gracious hey-hey-whattaya-say superstar next door.

The legion of elders who saw Musial play from 1941 to 1963 maintain that he would have higher recognition today as a career .331 hitter if he had played in a coastal city like New York, Boston or Los Angeles. What is overlooked is that the East Coast news media hectored Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams in ways large and small — in a kinder and gentler time before the

• 24-hour gnawing of the carpenter ants of blog land and Twitter land.

Pujols may not be prepared to be the $300 million savior of a rich franchise. Who is? After a bad second game here, he vanished into the night without dropping a few words to sate the news media. Later he said that he did not know anybody would want to talk to him, which just does not calibrate. Derek Jeter gives nothing away — nothing — but he shows up, says his controlled piece, and moves on."...

• Mr. Vecsey visited the sculpture garden of baseball players at Busch Stadium and did not find a statue of Curt Flood.

10/27/11, "Pujols Won’t Find Unconditional Love Anywhere Else," George Vecsey, NY Times

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