Major League Baseball announced its final All-Star ballot last night. With a few exceptions, voting is narrowed to two players per position in each league.
All-Star voting is tricky. It’s easy to want to give it to the best players, but with only half a season of results in so far, “best players” becomes hard to define. Is it the best player right now? Is it the best since the last All-Star Game? Is it the best since the last All-Star Game’s voting closed? The first round of that voting, or the second round? The exercise gets subjective even before the definition of stardom gets involved. And get involved it must! Because it’s not the All-MLB Game. It’s the All-Star Game.
Personally, I’ve recently tended to use long-term performance as a proxy for stardom. Who’s made the biggest impact over the last decade? Who’s had the best career so far? Cal Ripken Jr. was a bad hitter his last year in the majors. He was still a star.
To this end, I went through this morning and, with the help of FanGraphs, tried to find the best active player at each position in each league over the last “X” number of years, using fWAR and going all the way back to 2014. Because players change leagues and change positions, I tried to use current leagues and positions to draw boundaries, with positions defined by where a player appeared on this year’s All-Star Ballot. I am very scared I left out someone notable. But we’ve made it this far. Let’s go through the ballot, position by position:
NL Catcher
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Will Smith |
| 2023 | William Contreras |
| 2022 | Will Smith |
| 2021 | Will Smith |
| 2020 | Will Smith |
| 2019 | J.T. Realmuto |
| 2018 | J.T. Realmuto |
| 2017 | J.T. Realmuto |
| 2016 | J.T. Realmuto |
| 2015 | J.T. Realmuto |
| 2014 | J.T. Realmuto |
This is straightforward. Three guys, all very good catchers, all separated by age. After that, it gets perfectly subjective, but it starts off innocently enough! Of the three, Contreras and Realmuto ended up on the final ballot, and Realmuto’s hurt, so I’ll vote for Contreras. Were Smith in the final pair, I’d lean towards him. Contreras was better last season, but Smith’s having the better year and is more established as a star.
NL First Base
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Bryce Harper |
| 2023 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2022 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2021 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2020 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2019 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2018 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2017 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2016 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2015 | Freddie Freeman |
| 2014 | Freddie Freeman |
This one’s already decided. Harper led all National League voting and was automatically placed into the nominal starting lineup before last night’s hamstring injury. It’s interesting to see, though, for how long Freeman has outpaced his longtime rival. I would not have guessed that Freeman has more career production than Harper, but he does, and by more than ten percent, with very little of it coming before Harper entered the league. Getting back to stardom, Harper is the bigger star. But Freeman deserves the start I assume he’ll get with Harper likely sidelined.
NL Second Base
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Ketel Marte |
| 2023 | Ketel Marte |
| 2022 | Nico Hoerner |
| 2021 | Ketel Marte |
| 2020 | Ketel Marte |
| 2019 | Ketel Marte |
| 2018 | Ketel Marte |
| 2017 | Ketel Marte |
| 2016 | Ketel Marte |
| 2015 | Ketel Marte |
| 2014 | Ketel Marte |
Marte used to play more outfield, but he’s a second baseman now and has been for a few years. Among a thin current crop of National League keystoners, Marte is up against Luis Arraez in the final voting. Arraez is a big name because of his batting average. Marte is and has been a better player. Either will be a fine starter, but Marte has my vote.
NL Third Base
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Joey Ortiz |
| 2023 | Austin Riley |
| 2022 | Austin Riley |
| 2021 | Austin Riley |
| 2020 | Manny Machado |
| 2019 | Nolan Arenado |
| 2018 | Manny Machado |
| 2017 | Nolan Arenado |
| 2016 | Nolan Arenado |
| 2015 | Nolan Arenado |
| 2014 | Nolan Arenado |
Hats off to Joey Ortiz. This is a hard group to lead. Ortiz didn’t make final voting, though, and neither did Riley. It’s Alec Bohm vs. Machado. Philadelphia loves its baseball, but Machado is the bigger star.
NL Shortstop
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Elly De La Cruz |
| 2023 | Mookie Betts |
| 2022 | Mookie Betts |
| 2021 | Mookie Betts |
| 2020 | Mookie Betts |
| 2019 | Mookie Betts |
| 2018 | Mookie Betts |
| 2017 | Mookie Betts |
| 2016 | Mookie Betts |
| 2015 | Mookie Betts |
| 2014 | Mookie Betts |
Similarly to Ortiz, a moment of recognition for Elly De La Cruz. Betts will have my vote over Trea Turner, no matter how much I love watching the latter run the bases.
NL Outfield
| Since… | Best | 2nd | 3rd |
| 2024 | Jurickson Profar | Fernando Tatis Jr. | Brandon Nimmo |
| 2023 | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Fernando Tatis Jr. | Brandon Nimmo |
| 2022 | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Brandon Nimmo | Michael Harris II |
| 2021 | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Brandon Nimmo | Fernando Tatis Jr. |
| 2020 | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Brandon Nimmo | Fernando Tatis Jr. |
| 2019 | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Fernando Tatis Jr. | Brandon Nimmo |
| 2018 | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Christian Yelich | Brandon Nimmo |
| 2017 | Christian Yelich | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Brandon Nimmo |
| 2016 | Christian Yelich | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Brandon Nimmo |
| 2015 | Christian Yelich | Ronald Acuña Jr. | Starling Marte |
| 2014 | Christian Yelich | Starling Marte | Ronald Acuña Jr. |
Three outfielders make the starting lineup, and the six remaining in consideration are Profar, Yelich, Teoscar Hernández, Tatis, Brandon Marsh, and Nick Castellanos. Like Harper, Tatis is hurt, but he’d be a no-brainer if healthy, as would be Acuña, who got hurt early enough to miss voting. With no Nimmo among the finalists, my votes will be going to Yelich, Profar, and Hernández, the third of whom leads Marsh in “best since” for every year but 2023 and leads Castellanos in “best since” for every year in at least the last decade.
NL Designated Hitter
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2023 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2022 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2021 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2020 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2019 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2018 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2017 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2016 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2015 | Shohei Ohtani |
| 2014 | Shohei Ohtani |
Yes, we included Ohtani’s pitching here. Positions are a vehicle for streamlining the ballot. Their boundaries don’t dictate who is and is not a star. Also, Ohtani’s more a hitter than a pitcher. He does it more often, especially now, and he’s better at it. So, with all the love in the world towards Kyle Schwarber, who’s a finalist for this slot alongside Ohtani, this is an easy call.
AL Catcher
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2023 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2022 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2021 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2020 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2019 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2018 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2017 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2016 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2015 | Adley Rutschman |
| 2014 | Christian Vázquez |
This is hilarious. Rutschman entered the league in 2022. He’s up against Salvador Perez for that last spot. Perez is good! He is not Adley Rutschman, even with quite the head start.
AL First Base
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Carlos Santana |
| 2023 | Yandy Díaz |
| 2022 | Yandy Díaz |
| 2021 | Vladimir Guerrero Jr. |
| 2020 | Vladimir Guerrero Jr. |
| 2019 | Yandy Díaz |
| 2018 | Yandy Díaz |
| 2017 | Anthony Rizzo |
| 2016 | Anthony Rizzo |
| 2015 | Anthony Rizzo |
| 2014 | Anthony Rizzo |
This is a messy list, and before realizing Mark Canha was probably grouped as an outfielder, Mark Canha made an appearance. The finalists are Ryan Mountcastle and Guerrero. Guerrero gets the nod for me.
AL Second Base
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Jose Altuve |
| 2023 | Marcus Semien |
| 2022 | Jose Altuve |
| 2021 | Jose Altuve |
| 2020 | Marcus Semien |
| 2019 | Marcus Semien |
| 2018 | Jose Altuve |
| 2017 | Jose Altuve |
| 2016 | Jose Altuve |
| 2015 | Jose Altuve |
| 2014 | Jose Altuve |
A great rivalry, especially with the pair in the same division. Altuve is having the better year. Altuve has the bigger overall body of work. Semien is the reigning World Series champion. I’m going with Altuve, but I confess to liking Semien more.
AL Third Base
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | José Ramírez |
| 2023 | José Ramírez |
| 2022 | José Ramírez |
| 2021 | José Ramírez |
| 2020 | José Ramírez |
| 2019 | José Ramírez |
| 2018 | José Ramírez |
| 2017 | José Ramírez |
| 2016 | José Ramírez |
| 2015 | José Ramírez |
| 2014 | José Ramírez |
Well this is easy. Ramírez over Jake Westburg.
AL Shortstop
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Gunnar Henderson |
| 2023 | Gunnar Henderson |
| 2022 | Bobby Witt Jr. |
| 2021 | Corey Seager |
| 2020 | Corey Seager |
| 2019 | Corey Seager |
| 2018 | Carlos Correa |
| 2017 | Carlos Correa |
| 2016 | Carlos Correa |
| 2015 | Carlos Correa |
| 2014 | Carlos Correa |
The final two here are Henderson and Witt, which makes it easier for us because Seager would have been hard to vote against. Henderson should maybe be the MVP favorite. He’s not as established as Witt, but MVP contention is fairly synonymous with stardom.
AL Outfield
| Since… | Best | 2nd | 3rd |
| 2024 | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto | Steven Kwan |
| 2023 | Juan Soto | Aaron Judge | Kyle Tucker |
| 2022 | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto | Kyle Tucker |
| 2021 | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto | Kyle Tucker |
| 2020 | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto | Kyle Tucker |
| 2019 | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto | Mike Trout |
| 2018 | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto | Mike Trout |
| 2017 | Aaron Judge | Mike Trout | Juan Soto |
| 2016 | Mike Trout | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto |
| 2015 | Mike Trout | Aaron Judge | Juan Soto |
| 2014 | Mike Trout | Aaron Judge | George Springer |
Kyle Tucker’s often overshadowed by Altuve, Alex Bregman, and formerly Correa, but he’s been on this list for a long time, and since he should be back healthy in time, I’ll be voting for him rather than Kwan for the final AL spot (Judge locked up the first spot by getting the most votes of an AL player; Soto is an obvious choice). Anthony Santander is also a finalist, but he is not like the others.
AL Designated Hitter
| Since… | Best |
| 2024 | Yordan Alvarez |
| 2023 | Yordan Alvarez |
| 2022 | Yordan Alvarez |
| 2021 | Yordan Alvarez |
| 2020 | Yordan Alvarez |
| 2019 | Yordan Alvarez |
| 2018 | Yordan Alvarez |
| 2017 | Justin Turner |
| 2016 | Justin Turner |
| 2015 | Justin Turner |
| 2014 | Justin Turner |
To acknowledge the funkiness of this exercise: Turner did not accumulate his value at DH. That’s irrelevant, because Alvarez has been so clearly in a league of his own. Ryan O’Hearn’s the other finalist here.
My ballot, then, with asterisks for the players locked in:
| Position | NL | AL |
| C | William Contreras | Adley Rutschman |
| 1B | Bryce Harper* | Vladimir Guerrero Jr. |
| 2B | Ketel Marte | Jose Altuve |
| 3B | Manny Machado | José Ramírez |
| SS | Mookie Betts | Gunnar Henderson |
| OF | Christian Yelich | Aaron Judge* |
| OF | Jurickson Profar | Juan Soto |
| OF | Teoscar Hernández | Kyle Tucker |
| DH | Shohei Ohtani | Yordan Alvarez |
I still wish I could vote for Will Smith.
Miscellany – Purdue Pharma and the NCAA
Different Purdue than the one we usually talk about, but…the Supreme Court ruled yesterday that the Sackler family—who made billions of dollars personally through Purdue Pharma’s opioid sales and marketing tactics, all while Purdue Pharma became liable for estimated trillions of dollars of damages to opioid addicts and their families—cannot be shielded from future lawsuits through the word of a bankruptcy court alone. The Sacklers wanted to voluntarily hand over some of their billions to opioid survivors in exchange for the bankruptcy court ruling the Sacklers couldn’t personally be sued. The Supreme Court said no.
Why do we bring this up here? Because the possibility of future lawsuits is one of the red flags hanging over the much-hyped potential settlement to House v. NCAA. This is a different situation—Purdue Pharma went bankrupt, House v. NCAA is a class-action suit—but the cases are parallel. In both cases, someone made an immense profit by breaking laws an immense number of times. In both cases, that someone wants a court to accept their proposed settlement and say, “That’s it, this matter is settled,” leaving them a little less rich but a lot safer. In the Purdue/Sackler case, five Supreme Court justices (Gorsuch, Thomas, Alito, Coney Barrett, Brown Jackson) said, “Bankruptcy court doesn’t get to decide that.” With House v. NCAA, where the same nationwide issue is currently being litigated in multiple jurisdictions, would the justices rule the same way?
We’ll probably never know. It’s unlikely anything in the House v. NCAA arena ever reaches the Supreme Court, and the class-action vs. bankruptcy distinction is significant enough that it’s highly believable it could flip one justice. At the very least, though, put a pin in this.
Miscellany – Rich Paul’s Plan
The biggest story from this NBA Draft was an agent telling teams that the eventual 55th pick wouldn’t play for them if they drafted him, threatening that said player would go play professionally in Australia instead. The agent? Rich Paul. The player? Bronny James, of course.
What was Rich Paul’s endgame here? Let’s take a guess.
Rich Paul works for LeBron James, Bronny James, and a number of other NBA players. He works at their direction and in what he believes to be their best interest. Clearly, he believed playing on the Lakers was the best situation for Bronny James. He presumably has a commitment that the Lakers will give Bronny an NBA roster spot, as opposed to signing him to a two-way deal. If reporting in April and early May was accurate, this is a pivot from Paul’s earlier approach, when reporters friendly to Paul and the James family were heavily hitting the angle that the G-League could be a good fit for Bronny James. At some point, we can guess that the Lakers told Rich Paul, Hey, if Bronny’s available at 55, we’ll take him and we’ll put him on the NBA roster. Presumably, Rich Paul said, That sounds great, and I’m not going to promise anything, because we still have to negotiate on his next contract, but I think LeBron James would really like that.
Why did Rich Paul reportedly turn to threats, then? Because second round NBA draft picks are lottery tickets. They aren’t expected to work out. If one fails? That’s not a big loss. A team interested in LeBron, then, could have drafted Bronny in order to use Bronny as leverage in free agency. Combining the value of that leverage with what value Bronny presents himself (not much, but some—he’s short, and he might be the worst player on an NBA roster this year, but his genetics are great), it’s not outrageous that one team might have wanted to pull the trigger. Paul, then, went as nuclear as he could go, and the reports made him and the James family look silly, but they already look silly. They are silly. LeBron James is one of the best basketball players of all time, and he is also silly.
Miscellany – Miscellany
- Dumb decision by Tim Weah yesterday to strike a man in the head, and also the kind of undisciplined play that reflects poorly on a head coach. The U.S. now likely needs to upset Uruguay outright on Monday in order to advance out of the Copa América group stage, and there are scenarios where even a win is not enough. Uruguay is through with a draw, and they’d win the group in that scenario.
- The Wimbledon brackets are out, and in men’s singles, both Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray are playing. Djokovic’s presence made it possible for Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner to land on the same side of the bracket, and that’s indeed what happened (Djokovic took the 2-seed, pushing Alcaraz to the 3-seed, which can land on either side).
- I guess the NFL broke antitrust law in the Sunday Ticket case? This is one where not being a lawyer and/or a legal expert leaves me rather unable to wrap my head around the law behind the case. The gist is that the NFL limited competition in order to raise the price of out-of-market NFL games, and my impression is that it’s the exclusive nature of Sunday Ticket (formerly only available on DirecTV, now only available on YouTube TV) which makes this an issue. College sports and professional baseball, basketball, and hockey are carried by a variety of broadcasters. Like the NFL, they can pit those broadcasters against one another in bidding wars, but unlike how it goes with the NFL, that doesn’t leave consumers themselves paying an exorbitant rate. Or so goes the legal logic? Again, this is one I don’t understand very well. I do see that many expect the NFL to appeal.
- Syracuse is hiring Knicks scout Alex Kline to serve as its basketball program’s general manager. We’ve seen GM’s in college football, and I assume they exist in college basketball as well, but it’s a position that figures to balloon soon as athletic departments figure out that they, like many professional teams, can at least somewhat separate coaching and roster-building, allowing coaches to coach and roster-builders to build rosters.
