LaRussa's logic was that Pujols could play a lot of positions if the game went into extra innings.
I heard him say something similar during the game and it made sense then. But it was about holding him for the right moment late, not for extra innings. Tony's desire to have Pujols available for extra innings would not have been counteracted by pinch hitting him there. One of three things happen. He either ends the game with a loss, ends the game with a win, or they tie and go into extra innings. I really doubted that they would walk in the tying run, and if he puts the ball in play, it is more likely that it would end the game one way or another with bases loaded. If they did end up tying he goes into the game instead of Rowand. They would move Soriano over to CF and he said that Pujols could play LF if need be. This was an allstar game, not a regular season game where you would hold onto a bench player for extra innings. It would have made more sense to send Albert up there. I almost assume that LaRussa was judging Albert from his numbers this year and not on his career performance.