One mans All-Star Ballot: Part II

Well, it's taken me long enough, but here it finally is... part two of my look at all-star voting by the numbers. At this point this might be a bit ill-timed in comparison to part one - undoubtedly changed on the AL ballot since last time - but considering it took me three nights of writing and rewriting this, I think it's still time to soldier ahead just so I can get on with other things (like looking for some bright spots in our suddenly painfully inept offense).

It's been awhile since the National League has actually won an All-Star game, so this year it might be more important than ever to make certain they have the best players from their league representing them... unless of course you secretly enjoy seeing them fall flat on their faces year after year.

I'll admit, I kind of like to think of the NL's 12 year ASG drought as retribution for making us AL fans put up with this silly business of watching the pitchers hit during interleague (and even spring training) every year.

Just kidding.

Okay, maybe only sort of kidding.

Anyway, now that I've offended several million purists and NL fans, we might as well get on with this:

First Base

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The NL has some excellent first basemen - I think an argument could be made that deepest single position as far as raw talent goes on the all star ballot is NL first base, and has been for some time. This year however, two guys stand out above the rest, and that's the insanely talented Albert Pujols and one-time Ranger Adrian Gonzalez.

Pujols is of course on of the best, if not the best pure hitter in baseball so it shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that he leads NL first basemen in wOBA, OPS and just about everything else. In fact, been the most valuable offensive player in all of baseball this year if you go by Wins Above Replacement. His overall WAR has been hurt somewhat by his defense - he's kind of having an off-year at first base weighing in at almost 3 runs below replacement in UZR (first time he's been in the negative since 2005). So his overall WAR is 3.2 - only tied for fourth best in baseball with Ryan Zimmerman. I say only because his bat has been worth an even 30 runs above replacement this year, almost 6 runs better than second-best Raul Ibanez. Just imagine what his overall WAR would be if he had his usual stellar defensive numbers to back all that offensive value up.

Gonzalez (or as I like to refer to him, the real reason why the Adam Eaton for Chris Young deal stung) hasn't quite been the offensive beast Pujols has... but he's been close. The casual all-star voter might dismiss that notion looking at his batting average (.276, versus Pujols' .324) but beyond that veneer he's having a truly special season himself. Thanks to the fact that he's tied with Adam Dunn for the best walk rate in the NL (at 18.7 BB's per 9) he sports a .414 OBP, 8th in the NL. More importantly, he's third in the NL in slugging percentage and ISO (isolated power), which as you might have guessed means he's up there in homers - tied with Pujols and Ibanez for the NL lead with 22. Not too bad, as evidenced by the 24.2 runs above replacement Fangraphs has his bat valued at. Where's that rank compared to Pujols? Third in baseball, as a matter of fact, and a half win behind second place Ibanez.

That brings us to Gonzalez's advantage, and that's his defense. He's been worth 2 runs even at first base, tied for second among NL first sackers with Atlanta's Kasey Kotchman. Even though his D is a bit less impressive if you project it over 150 games (UZR/150) he's still been a lot better than Pujols this year, and as a result he's only 0.2 points behind big Albert in overall WAR at 3.0.

Pretty tough final decision here, for me at least. WAR-wise, it's pretty much a wash, although Pujols does have a slight edge. Albert's flat out been the most valuable offensive player in baseball this year, but A-Gon isn't far behind in offensive value himself, and his defense makes him the more rounded player. I really like Gonzalez a lot, but considering Pujols has long been considered a great glove at first (and has the numbers in the recent past to back it up) it's hard to penalize him too much for his D this year. And the easter egg is it would admittedly be kinda cool to see him starting the ASG in his home park considering the year he's having. It's close, but Pujols has my vote (for now at least).

Second Base

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From one of the closest individual position races on that ballot, we now go to one of the biggest no-brainers. There's really only one name you need to know among NL second basemen, and that's Chase Cameron Utley.

If that name doesn't strike fear, it should. His .441 wOBA (which happens to be fourth in all of baseball) is 67 points higher than the next-best Orlando Hudson and he's one of just 5 players in the NL (and 9 in baseball) who still have an OPS over 1.000 (none of whom happen to be second basemen). He seems to have backslid a bit from his stellar defensive seasons in 2007 and 2008 (just over a half run above replacement at second so far this year) but his 3.4 WAR is still nearly a win and a half better than second-place Brandon Phillips (2.0).

Shortstop

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The two NL middle infield spots really aren't to competitive this year, numbers-wise. At second base it's because Chase Utley can just mash, but at shortstop it's because Hanley Ramirez has finally learned to play defense. And because HanRam can mash too.

As usual, the cornerstone of the Florida Marlins franchise leads NL shortstops in wOBA, OPS and almost all the other offensive metrics. By now, pretty much anyone who follows the baseball should knows what Hanley is capable of with the bat. What's new however is he may be starting to overcome his reputation as an abhorrent defender - so far this year he's on the plus side in UZR and UZR/150 for the first time in his career. And this year that's what distances him from Miguel Tejada, who ranks second to Ramirez in wOBA and is tied for second in the NL in BA.

Tejada has been almost as bad, if not worse than Hanley has been in the past, ranking 7 runs below replacement this year and almost 16 runs below in UZR/150. In fact, both Tejada and the third-place man in wOBA among NL SS's, Yunel Escobar (4 runs below replacement in UZR) have been so bad defensively, the ever mediocre Ryan Theriot (just a .337 wOBA) actually beats them both out for the distant second place to Hanley in WAR at 1.6. Tejada has a 1.5, Escobar a 1.1. Oh, and Hanley? 2.8.

Third base

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This is was one of the more interesting positions I looked as far as options and offense vs. defense goes. On one hand you've got New York's David Wright, who happens to lead the majors in batting average and the NL in OBP, which helps him to a .431 wOBA, tops among NL 3B's.

As for the rest of the field, second among NL 3B's in wOBA is Mark Reynolds (whose name you've probably heard tossed around in discussions about Chris Davis as the guy who struck out 204 times last year) at .412, who has been bouncing back and forth between third base and first base since mid-May. Outside the 400+ wOBA stratosphere, we have Chipper Jones, still kicking it at 37 (and putting up a 918 OPS and a .389 wOBA), and Ryan Zimmerman (.388 wOBA). Though Wright is the clear leader of the pack offensively, there's a lot of pretty good third base options this year in the NL.

Defensively is where it gets interesting, because Jones, Wright and Reynolds have all been terrible defensively this year (well, Chipper and Wright have been, Reynolds has just been below average) whereas Ryan Zimmerman has been absolutely brilliant. Chipper has been the most suspect, ranking 3.6 runs below replacement in UZR (and almost a whopping 13 in UZR/150) and Wright isn't too far behind at minus 3 even. Reynolds is only about a half-run below replacement, although if you go per 150 games he looks a tad worse - but still nowhere near as bad as Wright and Chipper.

Zimmerman on the other hand not only leads NL third basemen in UZR, but has been the second-best defender in the NL (well, in terms of UZR, anyway), behind only Pirates OF Nyjer Morgan with an UZR of 8.0 and an UZR/150 of 19.9. The result is that Zim's actually leads the NL third base pack with a 3.2 WAR, David Wright trailing at 2.9 and Mark Reynolds third at 2.3. Jones defense has him at upper-mid pack with 1.5 WAR.

This leaves me with pretty much the same dilemma as with Pujols vs. Gonzalez at first base: the amazing offensive player, or the more well rounded (and in this case stellar) defender who's still more than holding his own offensively? It's another tossup, but this time I think I'll go with the complete package in Zimmerman.

Catcher

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As the guy who's pretty much NL's best offensive catcher Brian McCann has made the all-star squad as a backup three years in a row. He still has yet to start however, and if Yadier Molina's lead in the actual voting so far is any indication, he may still not get there this year. Which is really too bad, because he's pretty much been head and shoulders more valuable than any other NL catcher so far.

Despite spending time on the DL this year with an eye issue, McCann has been a terror at the plate this this year, posting a .953 OPS and a .412 wOBA. His 2.1 WAR is almost a full run better than any other NL catcher, and the only other starting catcher to even approach his offensive production is Carlos Ruiz with a .380 wOBA (well, Washington's Jesus Flores does too, but he might be out for the rest of the year).

As was discussed last time, there's no real defensive statistics for catchers, so I really couldn't tell you if McCann is costing his team any runs with his glove or not, but if the offensive stats are any indication it'll be a shame if he's beat out by Molina (whose .319 wOBA is uninspiring, to say the least). In fact, on an unrelated note, why in the world do people think that Yadier Molina is good?

Outfielders

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There's plenty of good choices to fill out your three outfield votes in the NL this year, lead by a somewhat surprising contender: Raul Ibanez. Most people felt that the Phillies where taking a definite downgrade when they replaced free agent Pat Burrell by signing an aging Ibanez over the winter, but so far the Phils have enjoyed surprisingly ridiculous production out of Ibanez's bat, and even more surprisingly, good defense from a guy who's been a noted butcher in the past. Not only does Ibanez's .444 wOBA lead NL outfielders, it's second to only Albert Pujols in the entire NL. And he's actually plus 2.3 runs in left field so far, after being minus 15 and 20 runs there the last two years in Seattle. Who'd a thunk it, but he actually leads the NL in WAR so far at 3.3.

Among the other options, Carlos Beltran (.430 wOBA) Ryan Braun (.427 wOBA) Brad Hawpe (.424) and Justin Upton (.414) are the rest of the top 5 among NL OF's in wOBA. Hawpe's awful defense (-6.6 runs in UZR) however separates him from the rest of the pack in WAR however, dropping him out of the top 10 while Matt Kemp's awesome UZR of 8 vaults him into a narrow second in overall value at 2.9. Braun is just one point behind at 2.8, while Upton and Beltran sit tied at 2.6. You can pretty much throw a couple darts at those four and come out with an appropriate choice, but I'll go with Beltran and Kemp to get the respective best of the rest in offense and defense.