Everyone has their favorite players, I get it. And the most popular teams usually have the most amount of all stars. I get that also.
But every year there are players left off the All Star team that are such obvious snubs, it's ridiculous.
The most obvious this year is Max Scherzer.
Max has been battled by little to no run support on the season leading to a 7-4 record, but it's not for a lack of Max's efforts. He has a 2.10ERA and has allowed only 59 hits over 94.1 innings. In those 94.1 innings, Max has struck out 127 batters and has limited opponents to less than 1 base runner per inning (0.85WHIP). He is easily still a top 5 pitcher in the National League as proven by these stats.
On a controversial note is a player who hasn't put up All Star level numbers, but is going to make the National League All Star Team for the first time in his Dodgers career.
Let's look at his triple slash line .246/.356/.453 good for an OPS of .809. He has 11 HR, 7SB, 32RBI, and 50R while being one of the league's leaders with 43 BB.
The player above is Mookie Betts, playing in his age 28 season and having made his 5th All Star Team.
Now let's look at the 34 year old Andrew McCutchen who also plays a corner outfield spot.
.233/.351/.448 good for a .799 OPS
He has 15HR, 6SB, 48RBI and 46R and is in third place with 46BB.
Now I'm not saying that Betts is a bad player, but Cutch's numbers are right there nearly identical to a player that many casual fans feel is a top 5 player in the game.
In case you missed it both Andrew McCutchen and Mookie Betts lent their voices to a Disney Channel cartoon called Puppy Dog Pals. You can read the article here.
I haven't had the chance to watch the episode, but I would love to get a custom card made featuring signatures of Betts and Cutch in the future.
I really wish Cutch would make another All Star Team.
I want some more Triple Threads patches limited to 9 copies in the collection.
Who do you think are the biggest All Star snubs this year?
The All-Star thing has always been problematic. It's as much of a popularity contest as it is based on a players performance. In fact, since the pitchers aren't voted in, that is more performance based, right? Scherzer should have been included, for sure. And McCutchen is having a great year, following on his pretty decent shortened 2020 season. To be on a 25+ homer pace is great.
ReplyDeleteI've long said most baseball fans are just dumb, and vote for a name instead of paying attention to the players that deserve to be thee.
ReplyDeleteThe Tigers representative should've Akil Baddoo, who's energized the team since Day 1.
Good Job. 👍
I haven't compared his stats to the other AL starting pitchers so I won't say he was snubbed, but Sean Manaea has been pretty solid for the A's.
ReplyDeleteProbably Max. I though Gary Sanchez had a shot, but not a big snub.
ReplyDeleteMookie Betts is one of the biggest stars in the league. He absolutely should be playing. It's the All-Star Game, not the All-Having-The-Best-Year Game.
ReplyDeleteI do love that Betts and Cutch are doing cartoon voices. Anything that promotes baseball stars to the mainstream, especially young people, is good for the game.