{"id":4254,"date":"2012-07-02T18:39:40","date_gmt":"2012-07-02T22:39:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=4254"},"modified":"2012-11-15T10:08:29","modified_gmt":"2012-11-15T15:08:29","slug":"nats-all-star-review-2012-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=4254","title":{"rendered":"Nats all-star review (2012 edition)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_4260\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/GonzalezGioNats.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-4260\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-4260\" title=\"GonzalezGioNats\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/GonzalezGioNats-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/GonzalezGioNats-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/GonzalezGioNats.jpg 606w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-4260\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gonzalez gets a very deserving NL All-Star selection.  Photo unknown via WP.com<\/p><\/div>\n<p>(Note: i&#8217;m copying a large chunk of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=1938\">2011&#8217;s version of this post<\/a> to give a running history of the Nats all-stars later on below).<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/mlb.mlb.com\/news\/article.jsp?ymd=20120701&amp;content_id=34263550&amp;vkey=news_mlb&amp;c_id=mlb\">MLB announced the 2012 all-star rosters<\/a> and the Nats, for the first time in their history in Washington, have 3 representatives.\u00a0 Here&#8217;s a discussion:<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>2012<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives:<strong> Stephen Strasburg<\/strong>, <strong>Gio Gonzalez<\/strong>, <strong>Ian Desmond<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Adam LaRoche<\/strong>, <strong>Bryce Harper,<\/strong> <strong>Craig Stammen<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Narrative: The two starters Strasburg and Gonzalez were the obvious candidates, and my personal prediction was that they&#8217;d be the only two candidates selected.\u00a0 The inclusion of Desmond is a surprise, but also a testament to how far he&#8217;s come as a player in 2012.\u00a0 I entered the season figuring that Desmond would be closer to a demotion than the all-star team, and his power from the short stop position has been a huge shot in the arm to our challenged offense.\u00a0 LaRoche has had a fantastic come back season but fared little shot against better, more well-known NL first basemen so his non-inclusion is not too surprising.\u00a0 Stammen has been our best bullpen arm, but like LaRoche fared little chance of getting selected during a year when the Nats had two deserving starters.\u00a0 Lastly Mr. Harper; he wasn&#8217;t on the ballot so fared little shot of being included, but has been put on the &#8220;last man in&#8221; ballot, up against a series of established veterans and future hall of famers.\u00a0 We&#8217;ll see if celebrity wins out.\u00a0 Before his slump the last two weeks he was clearly among the best hitters in the league despite his age.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>(<strong>Editors Note<\/strong>: Harper was subsequently added on 7\/7\/12 to replace the injured <strong>Giancarlo Stanton<\/strong>).<\/p>\n<p>Coincidentally, I thought <strong>Matt Kemp<\/strong>&#8216;s decision to go public with his snub of Harper for the home run derby was both short sighted and disappointing.\u00a0 If I was <strong>Bud Selig<\/strong>, I&#8217;d take the opportunity to make this year&#8217;s derby the most watched mid-season baseball event ever by forcing the inclusion of both Harper and uber-rookie <strong>Mike Trout<\/strong>.\u00a0 Ask yourself this: 1) do you bother to watch the home run derby now?\u00a0 And 2) if Harper and Trout were in it, would you watch this year&#8217;s version?\u00a0 For me, even as an avid baseball fan I don&#8217;t bother to watch the event and wasn&#8217;t planning on it this year &#8230; but with these two guys in, it&#8217;d be must-see TV.\u00a0 I hate it when Baseball misses such an obvious chance to showcase players and take advantage of the prevailing storylines of the season; it seems to happen year after year.<\/p>\n<p>For a trip down Memory lane, here&#8217;s the Nationals all stars by year and talk  about their selection, whether they were deserving, and who got snubbed  each year.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2005_Major_League_Baseball_All-Star_Game\"><em><strong>2005<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives: <strong>Livan Hernandez<\/strong>, <strong>Chad Cordero<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Nick Johnson<\/strong>, <strong>John Patterson<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Narrative: The Nats went into the All Star break surprisingly in  first place, having run to a 50-31 record by the halfway point.\u00a0 Should a  first place team have gotten more than just two representatives?\u00a0  Perhaps.\u00a0 But the team was filled with non-stars and played far over its  head to go 50-31 (as evidenced by the reverse 31-50 record the rest of  the way).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><em><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2006_Major_League_Baseball_All-Star_Game\">2006<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives: <strong>Alfonso Soriano<\/strong><strong> <\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Nick Johnson<\/strong>, <strong>Ryan Zimmerman<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Narrative: Soriano made the team as an elected starter, the only  time the Nats have had such an honor.\u00a0 Our pitching staff took massive  steps backwards and no starter came even close to meriting a spot.\u00a0  Cordero was good but not lights out as he had been in 2005.\u00a0 Soriano&#8217;s  40-40 season is a poster child for &#8220;contract year&#8221; production and he has  failed to come close to such production since.\u00a0 The team was poor and  getting worse.\u00a0 Johnson had a career year but got overshadowed by  bigger, better first basemen in the league (a recurring theme for our first basemen over the years).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2007_Major_League_Baseball_All-Star_Game\"><em><strong>2007<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives: <strong>Dmitri Young<\/strong><strong> <\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Ryan Zimmerman, Shawn Hill<\/strong> (though I wouldn&#8217;t argue for either)<\/li>\n<li>Narrative: Young gets a deserved all-star appearance en route to  comeback player of the year.\u00a0 Zimmerman played a full season but didn&#8217;t  dominate.\u00a0 Our rotation featured 6 primary starters, none of whom are  still in the league now, though Hill showed flashes of dominance  throughout the year.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2008_Major_League_Baseball_All-Star_Game\"><em><strong>2008<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives: <strong>Cristian Guzman<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Jon Rauch<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Narrative: The first of two &#8220;hitting rock-bottom&#8221; seasons for the  team; no one really merited selection.\u00a0 Zimmerman was coming off of  hamate-bone surgery in November 2007 and the team was more or less awful  across the board.\u00a0 Rauch performed ably after Cordero went down with  season-ending (and basically career-ending) shoulder surgery.\u00a0\u00a0 Guzman&#8217;s  selection a great example of why one-per-team rules don&#8217;t make any  sense.\u00a0 Guzman ended up playing far longer than he deserved in the game itself by virtue of  the 15-inning affair.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2009_Major_League_Baseball_All-Star_Game\"><em><strong>2009<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives: <strong>Ryan Zimmerman<\/strong><strong> <\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Adam Dunn<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Narrative: The addition of Dunn and Willingham to the lineup gave  Zimmerman the protection he never had, and he produced with his  career-best season.\u00a0 His first and deserved all-star appearance en-route  to a 33 homer season.\u00a0 Dunn continued his monster homer totals with  little all-star recognition.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2010_Major_League_Baseball_All-Star_Game\"><em><strong>2010<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives: <strong>Matt Capps<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Adam Dunn<\/strong>, <strong>Josh Willingham<\/strong>, <strong>Ryan Zimmerman, Steven Strasburg<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Narrative: Capps was clearly deserving, having a breakout season as a  closer after his off-season non-tender from the Pirates.\u00a0 The 3-4-5  hitters Zimmerman-Dunn-Willingham all had dominant offensive seasons as  the team improved markedly from its 103-loss season.\u00a0 But perhaps the  surprise non-inclusion was Strasburg, who despite only having a few  starts as of the all-star break was already the talk of baseball.\u00a0 I  think MLB missed a great PR opportunity to name him to the team to give  him the exposure that the rest of the national media expected.\u00a0 But in  the end, Capps was a deserving candidate and I can&#8217;t argue that our  hitters did anything special enough to merit inclusion.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/2011_Major_League_Baseball_All-Star_Game\"><em><strong>2011<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Nationals All-Star representatives:<strong> Tyler Clippard<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Possible Snubs: <strong>Danny Espinosa<\/strong>, <strong>Michael Morse<\/strong>, <strong>Drew Storen<\/strong>, <strong>Jordan Zimmermann<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Narrative: While Clippard was (arguably) the Nats best and most  important reliever, I think Zimmermann was a more rightful choice.\u00a0 He  was 10th in the league in ERA at the time of the selections and has put  in a series of dominant performances.\u00a0 Meanwhile Espinosa is on pace for  a 28homer season and almost a certain Rookie-of-the-Year award (though a precipitous fall-off in the 2nd half cost him any realistic shot at the ROY), and  perhaps both players are just too young to be known around the league.\u00a0  Lastly Morse is certainly known and he merited a spot in the &#8220;last man  in&#8221; vote sponsored by MLB (though he fared little chance against popular  players in this last-man-in voting).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Note: i&#8217;m copying a large chunk of 2011&#8217;s version of this post to give a running history of the Nats all-stars later on below). MLB announced the 2012 all-star rosters and the Nats, for the first time in their history in Washington, have 3 representatives.\u00a0 Here&#8217;s a discussion: 2012 Nationals All-Star representatives: Stephen Strasburg, Gio [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[139,184,130,164,365,861,98,1219,135,585,52,795,385,114,517,865,43,580,41,434,145,136,456,862,36,864,38,128],"class_list":["post-4254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-natsgeneral","tag-adam-dunn","tag-adam-laroche","tag-alfonso-soriano","tag-bryce-harper","tag-bud-selig","tag-chad-cordero","tag-craig-stammen","tag-cristian-guzman","tag-danny-espinosa","tag-dmitri-young","tag-drew-storen","tag-giancarlo-stanton","tag-gio-gonzalez","tag-ian-desmond","tag-john-patterson","tag-jon-rauch","tag-jordan-zimmermann","tag-josh-willingham","tag-livan-hernandez","tag-matt-capps","tag-matt-kemp","tag-michael-morse","tag-mike-trout","tag-nick-johnson","tag-ryan-zimmerman","tag-shawn-hill","tag-stephen-strasburg","tag-tyler-clippard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4254"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4254\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4262,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4254\/revisions\/4262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}