MLB All-Star Game: June 8 AL Ballot Update
Last night while watching the Twins at Target Field I thought that this would be the series to show the Royals how tough the Twins are, compared to last year. But after viewing the updated MLB All-Star ballot I realized that my tickets were not for a Kansas City Royals game. They were in fact tickets to see the Twins play the American League All-Stars.
By now if you haven’t seen the updated All-Star Game ballot yet, here is what you need to know.
@MLB @Royals @esurance as a Royals fan, even I think this is ridiculous
— CEO of Montegridy Farms, Inc (@RoyalsMLBChamps) June 8, 2015
And this too.
@mlb this just shows you need to change the way ASG teams are selected
— Tom Caliendo (@tommyc325) June 8, 2015
The American League side has seven Royals (Salvador Perez, Eric Hosmer, Mike Moustakas, Alcides Escobar, Lorenzo Cain, Alex Gordon and Kendrys Morales) with a lead in voting at their respective positions. Two more Royals are in a position battle (Omar Infante and Alex Rios) but are still higher than other deserving players.
The update which is provided by MLB.com shows who has the lead in votes, the top five at each position and how many votes each player has. This year the fan voting is exclusively online. No more paper ballots.
Is online voting the reason entire Royals team is on top in votes? It shouldn’t be. At least I hope that is not the case. This video explains some possible reasons why so many Royals are slated to start at the All-Star Game.
My solution is to limit how many players from each team a person can vote for. Make the limit no higher than two. This would allow for fans to continue to vote for their favorite team’s player but not all of them. Since voting can occur 35 times per email account the voter can switch up who they want from their favorite team. With this system of voting guys like Rios and Infante won’t be above more deserving All-Star caliber players like Brian Dozier or Torii Hunter. Both Dozier and Hunter should be getting way more votes than what they currently have.
I will admit that I did vote for Kendrys Morales a couple of times already. In my defense, he’s playing like an All-Star and was well behind Nelson Cruz in DH voting. Now one of the best hitters so far in the American League is not starting because he does not have enough votes. Many other players I believe are All-Stars but are not getting enough votes, but that is a whole other discussion.
For every one who, like me, does not want to watch the Royals play the National League in the All-Star Game go to MLB.com to vote and make a difference.