Once upon a time, not too long ago, Americans from far and wide — driven by a passionate love of democracy and a fiery desire for equal representation — banded together to overcome the tyrannical rule of a Royal regime.
After weeks of a heated debate that pitted city against city and brother against brother, battle lines were drawn.
The struggle was real, but freedom and justice prevailed thanks to the courage and sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of brave patriots who flocked to their smartphones and computers to overthrow their mighty oppressors.
Between your fuzzy recollection of that United States history class you took in high school, and all those times you stumbled upon something on the History Channel that wasn’t about pawn shop-owning alligator hunters, you probably don’t remember much about the second Continental Congress spending hours to draft the perfect break-up text to King George III or George Washington taking a selfie while crossing the Delaware.
That’s because I’m not talking about the Revolutionary War. I am talking about the team selection for Major League Baseball’s 2015 All-Star Game: an event equally American and far more relevant for die-hard baseball fans today.
On Sunday, one day after the 239th anniversary of this country’s separation from Great Britain, the American League officially declared its independence from the legions of Royals fans that had hijacked the voting and nearly succeeded in filling eight of the nine starting positions with Kansas City players.
I’ll admit that I am being a little over-dramatic. After all, wouldn’t any Royals fan point out that extensive marketing, organization and encouraging voter turnout are valid strategies employed by every political group in the country to win an election?
But this is baseball, not politics. While almost every fan-determined All-Star game roster possesses players picked solely because of their personality and relationship with the fans rather than talent, the Royals fans’ exploitation of the voting system had many calling for a sharp reduction of the 35-vote limit per email address and the possible return of in-stadium voting only.
Don’t get me wrong, Kansas City is a very talented team and the four Royals that managed to remain on top of the leaderboards—catcher Salvador Perez, shortstop Alcides Escobar, and outfielders Lorenzo Cain and Alex Gordon— are definitely good enough to be in the All-Star discussion.
The MLB heeded the call to arms and invalidated roughly 65 million votes they deemed suspicious. Had it not been for this and a late surge in voting by other teams’ fans, we could have seen an American League starting lineup with the Angels’ Mike Trout being the only player not in Kansas City blue.
Perhaps the biggest outrage for non-Royal fans, and a driving factor behind their race to the polls was the fact that Royals’ second-baseman Omar Infante had the most votes until the final tally, despite boasting an unimpressive .231 batting average and not having hit a home run all season.
Four players— Tigers’ first baseman Miguel Cabrera, Astros’ second baseman Jose Altuve, Blue Jays’ third baseman Josh Donaldson and Mariners’ designated hitter Nelson Cruz —were able to tally enough votes to join Mike Trout in edging out the Royals’ players. Donaldson secured an All-Star Game record of 14 million votes to take the position from Royals favorite Mike Moustakas, who had over 12 million votes.
The National League race was much less close and fans were not fooling around when it came to their selections. The NL starting roster boasts Giants’ catcher Buster Posey, D-backs’ first baseman Paul Goldschmidt, Marlins’ second baseman Dee Gordon, Reds’ third baseman Todd Frazier, Cardinals’ shortstop Jhonny Peralta, and outfielders Bryce Harper (Nationals), Matt Holliday (Cardinals) and Giancarlo Stanton (Marlins).
While Royals fans are to be commended for their fervent support and unilateral voting to put their favorite players on the ballot, their efforts are a bit misguided.
To the winner goes the spoils; in this case, a victory by the American League would secure the home-field advantage for the World Series. So, considering that KC is leading the AL Central and will likely return to the playoffs, the Royal fans’ best chance of World Series success would be to put together a true All-Star roster and vote for the best players in the American League.
It was also somewhat illogical for a rag-tag bunch of colonists to take on the might of the British Empire. But they did, with great fever and patriotic spirit and because of that, we celebrate in July by chowing down on hot dogs, lighting fireworks and talking about baseball.
For defying reason and voting based on raw emotion and hometown spirit, I salute all the Kansas City fans out there, and despite their best efforts to make the AL roster a Royals-only affair, the July 14 All-Star Game in Cincinnati is shaping up to be an All-Star spangled showdown.
@tylerfcrum