Five Cardinals Selected for 2015 National League All-Star Team

With the St. Louis Cardinals currently possessing a historically good 53-28 record, it was a near certainty that the team would be heavily represented on the 2015 National League All-Star Team. To the shock of no one, that ended up happening on Sunday and Monday, as five Cardinals were named to the initial All-Star roster, with the potential for a sixth to be added through a fan vote.

Left fielder Matt Holliday and shortstop Jhonny Peralta were the first Cardinals named to the team, as they were part of the fan-elected starting lineup announced on Sunday evening.

Holliday, who has been sidelined by a torn quad since June 8, is expected to make his return to the field in time for Tuesday’s Midsummer Classic. It’s difficult to justify Holliday’s presence on the team, let alone in the starting lineup, since he has roughly 100 fewer at-bats than most of his fellow NL outfielders, but with his fellow elected starter, Giancarlo Stanton, also sidelined with an injury, there weren’t a whole lot of alternatives that stood out as clearly superior to Holliday. If he ultimately ends up playing next Tuesday, the .303 hitter could provide a big boost to the NL lineup.

Peralta, who is having the greatest season of his 13-year MLB career to this point, stood out above all the other NL shortstops, being more well-rounded in terms of average, home runs, and OPS than potential alternatives like Troy Tulowitzki, Brandon Crawford, and Adeiny Hechavarria. The 33-year-old is also having a strong defensive season and will be an All-Star starter for the first time in his career. That’s a particularly impressive feat for Peralta, considering the potential lasting implications that he could have faced with his public reputation following his 2013 performance-enhancing drug suspension.

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Rosenthal, meanwhile, has been arguably the best closer in the National League, and really only Kansas City’s Wade Davis can challenge Rosenthal in terms of being the most shutdown reliever in Major League Baseball through the first half of 2015. With a 0.70 ERA, .197 opponent batting average, 1.04 WHIP, and a near-perfect 24 saves in 25 opportunities, Rosenthal more than deserved his first All-Star appointment. It wouldn’t be a surprise if manager Bruce Bochy calls on him in the ninth inning if the National League has the lead next Tuesday.

If there was any imposing competition at the catcher position in the National League this season, Molina might have missed the cut for the Midsummer Classic for the first time since 2008. However, with only two NL catchers, San Francisco’s Buster Posey and the Dodgers’ Yasmani Grandal, having standout offensive seasons, and the two others who are vastly outperforming Molina at the plate, Pittsburgh’s Francisco Cervelli and Colorado’s Nick Hundley, viewed as potentially “fluky” in many circles, Molina still managed to make the team based on reputation. Despite the fact that Molina has a respectable .292 batting average, he has just two homers and failed to hit even one until June 15. His current OPS of .706 is on pace to be his worst since 2006, and he’s having one of his most lackluster defensive seasons since he came into the league. But with Molina being nearly unanimously viewed as one of the greatest defensive catchers of all time and a spectacular leader of a pitching staff, he was able to gain the edge and make the roster, albeit as a backup.

In addition to the five Cardinals who are already on the All-Star roster, a sixth could be added by way of the league’s annual “Final Vote” initiative. Starting pitcher Carlos Martinez is eligible to be added to the roster, provided that he wins a fan vote against Cincinnati Reds starter Johnny Cueto, Los Angeles Dodgers lefty Clayton Kershaw, New York Mets closer Jeurys Familia, and Colorado Rockies shortstop Troy Tulowitzki. Considering that Cueto would be an attraction for the host crowd in Cincinnati, while the NL currently has just two shortstops on the roster, a conspiracy theorist might suggest that Martinez is at a competitive disadvantage to Cueto and Tulowitzki in his bid to make the team. Cardinals fans can change that, however, with a strong online voting campaign.

Besides Martinez, a few Cardinals players who could be considered “snubs” were omitted from the initial All-Star roster. Third baseman Matt Carpenter, who led the fan vote at third base for most of the process, was overtaken by the statistically superior Todd Frazier, and he wasn’t able to make his way onto the roster by virtue of the player or manager selections. After hitting .318 with eight homers through the season’s first two months, Carpenter is hitting just .194 with no homers and just four extra-base hits (all doubles) since June 1. In terms of offensive production, Carpenter has fallen behind the players who ultimately made the All-Star team (Frazier, Nolan Arenado, and Kris Bryant), as well as guys like Yunel Escobar, Matt Duffy, Justin Turner, and Maikel Franco, so it’s probably best that Carpenter didn’t end up being voted into the game by the fans.

Second baseman Kolten Wong could have made a strong case for being on the roster, as he has a higher OPS than Rockies second baseman D.J. LeMahieu (who plays in a strong hitter’s park) while also being a superior defensive player. However, the players went with the traditional metric of batting average, where LeMahieu has a .298 mark that’s superior to .279, so with manager Bruce Bochy electing his own deserving second baseman, Joe Panik, to the team, there was no space left for Wong.

Next: Matt Holliday Could Return Within the Next Week

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St. Louis Cardinals: Five Players Selected to 2015 MLB All-Star Game Roster

By Patrick Karraker | Jul 6, 2015

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