Minnesota Twins: Twins struggling in the early All-Star Game Voting

Voting is open for the first phase of the MLB All-Star game, and the first round of voting results was released today. Unfortunately for the Minnesota Twins and their fans, the team with the fourth best record in the American League doesn’t have a strong voting block.

Now this shouldn’t be completely surprising. East Coast players (with a few West Coast studs sprinkled in) typically dominate the voting. The Twins’ usually don’t have more than a few representatives, even in their best year. With that being said, the team is struggling to even get their usual representation.

The Minnesota Twins are struggling in the early All-Star voting in 2022, but should they be faring better?

Last year, the Twins sent two players to the All-Star game in Taylor Rogers and Nelson Cruz, and with neither player in a Minnesota uniform currently, the 2022 representative will be a player who didn’t represent the team last year. There are plenty of good candidates, but they all seem to be falling behind in the polls.

Gio Urshela is currently seventh, Jorge Polanco is sixth, and Kyle Garlick is currently eighth in American League voting, but outside of that, most of the rankings don’t feel right. Max Kepler and Trevor Larnach aren’t in the Top 20 in the outfield, which isn’t right considering Jackie Bradley Jr., Kiké Hernandez, and Joey Gallo are ahead of them.

Gary Sanchez is currently sixth among catchers, which isn’t right. He’s fifth among catchers in OPS, tied for second in homers, and his defense is much improved from prior years. He should be higher than Salvador Perez and Christian Vazquez.

Carlos Correa has played in 46 of his team’s games, but still sits in sixth behind the likes of Isiah Kiner-Falefa, Bo Bichette, and Jeremy Pena. At worst, he should be third, as the majority of his stats put him behind only Xander Bogaerts and Tim Anderson.

In the outfield, Byron Buxton is sixth behind Mike Trout, Aaron Judge, George Springer, Giancarlo Stanton, and Taylor Ward. Ward, Judge, and Trout have been dominant so far, but Stanton and Buxton haven’t been nearly as valuable.

The worst voting failure easily has to be Luis Arraez. Through the first 60 games of the season, Luis Arraez leads the entirety of Major League Baseball in batting average (he leads by 18 points) and on-base percentage (he leads by twenty-two points). Among first basemen, he has the American League’s highest OPS (.874) and ranks ninth in the A.L. overall.

Despite this, he sits FOURTH, behind Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Anthony Rizzo, and Ty France. All three are deserving candidates, but none have put together the near-historic season that Arraez has this year. He should make the game, but he needs more votes than he has.

All things considered, the Minnesota Twins deserve to have more than just one player in the All-Star game, and Luis Arraez needs to be getting more votes than he is. Go vote our Minnesota Twins into the game here!