Albert Pujols hit his 600th home run yesterday. This led me to reflect on the time spent watching Albert play for the Cardinals with my dad, the greatest decade in baseball history by a hitter. I can remember back to the beginnings of his rookie season and my dad telling me about Albert. How he was beating all expectations and there was no way he wouldn’t make the opening day roster. He was going to be special. My dad was an avid Cardinals fan. From listening to them on the radio for years, then on real audio on the computer, to watching them on the computer with MLB.tv, and finally to watching every game on tv with an MLB pass.

While Albert was putting together the best hitting decade of all time my dad began to battle cancer. In 2013 my dad lost his over 9 year battle to cancer. The cardinals and Albert kept him entertained and kept his mind active. He always looked forward to the next game during the season or discussion during the offseason and spring training.

Baseball was a big part of our lives together. Besides watching and discussing the Cardinals games we played fantasy baseball teams together for years. From discussing picks to in game moves with my dad, it was fun. My dad could get anywhere on MLB.com but never visited other sites due to fear of “messing things up.” So I  set his homepage to MLB.com and I enjoyed managing the teams for us. With his guidance Albert was always on our team.

My dad always said it was a “Game of Inches.”

I miss my dad.