2012 Brassball All-Stars

Baseball fans love to debate.  It doesn’t really matter what it is – we can debate, or even flat-out argue, about it.  We’ll debate who should be in the Hall of Fame, who should be the MVP and, of course, who should be on the All-Star team.  This year is no different. 

Some of the All-Star selections seemed like no-brainers.  Of course Mike Stanton and his 32 homers and Brassball leading 98 RBIs will be starting, just like Jacoby Ellbsury and his 27 homers and 51 stolen bases.  But what about Justin Upton?  And how do we have an All-Star game without Albert Pujols?  Let’s take a look at who deserved to make the team and who didn’t.

First, we need to establish some ground rules.  How do you compare a player like Carlos Gonzalez, who has 383 plate appearances, and Matt Kemp, who has 485?  Rather than break out the heavy Sabermetric tools, we’ll settle for something quick and dirty.  Let’s use Gonzalez and Kemp as an example:

Gonzalez has 383 plate appearances and a .992 OPS while Kemp has 485 plate appearances and an .890 OPS.  Multiplying those two numbers will give Kemp credit for all his extra plate appearances and Gonzalez credit for his much higher OPS. 

Gonzalez: 383 x .992 = 387.0

Kemp: 485 x .890 = 435.0

For this article, I’ll call that Weighted OPS (wOPS) and use it as a simple measure to identify those surprising All-Star starters, subs and snubs. 

Miguel Cabrera leads all of Brassball in wOPS and by a wide margin.  He signed a huge contract in the offseason to stay with Fleetwood and has not disappointed.  So far, Cabrera has earned his $7,000,000 his starting spot at 1B for the National League. 

Across baseball, the four highest wOPS hitters are all starting the game:

1.     Miguel Cabrera – 512.6

2.     Jacoby Ellsbury – 464.1

3.     Melky Cabrera – 457.3

4.     Adrian Gonzalez – 449.0

Let’s look at the starters for each league and see how their wOPS ranks in all of Brassball:

National League

C – Miguel Montero – 370.5 wOPS – #34 overall

1B – Miguel Cabrera – 512.6 – 1

2B – Robinson Cano – 382.0 – 26

3B – Pablo Sandoval – 391.2 – 19

SS – Jose Reyes – 373.8 – 32

LF – Alex Gordon – 404.0 – 15

CF – Jacoby Ellsbury – 464.1 – 2

RF – Mike Stanton – 425.9 – 9

DH - Mike Napoli – 405.4 – 14

American League

C – Wilson Ramos – 244.2 – 130

1B – Adrian Gonzalez – 449.0 – 4

2B – Michael Young – 395.9 – 17

3B – Adrian Beltre – 372.2 – 33

SS – Troy Tulowitzki – 379.0 – 28

LF – Carlos Gonzalez – 387.0 – 21

CF – Matt Kemp – 435.0 – 7

RF – Melky Cabrera – 457.3 – 3

DH – Victor Martinez – 365.9 – 37

So, six of the top ten and 11 of the top 25 were voted to start the game.  Not too bad.  Among starters, the one name that sticks out is Cook County’s Wilson Ramos, who is ranked 130 in Brassball.  A big part of his ranking is Ramos’s relatively small number of plate appearances, as his .825 OPS is very strong.  As a catcher on a juggernaut offense, Ramos gets regular days off, which pushes his wOPS down quite a bit.  With that exception, every other All-Star starter is in the top 37 players in the league, based on wOPS.

Who are the big snubs?  The line starts behind Superior’s Justin Upton and Glen Allen’s Albert Pujols.  Those two are ranked #5 and 6 in all of baseball, but will get extra time with their family instead of an all-expense trip to Florence. 

Although Pujols clearly deserved a spot on the team, it would be hard to make him the NL first baseman ahead of Miguel Cabrera.  That’s not true for Justin Upton, who not only deserved to be on the AL’s squad but should also have been a starting outfielder.  Upton has been at least as good as Cook County’s Matt Kemp and much more valuable than Carlos Gonzalez due to CarGo’s missed time.  

Only two other hitters in the top 20 failed to make the game:  North Georgia’s Mark Teixeira (#13), Metropolis’s Andrew McCutchen (#18) and Hessville’s Gaby Sanchez (#20).

Among the All-Star reserves, Springfield’s Hunter Pence and Metropolis’s Jose Bautista have the best argument to be starters and not reserves.  Pence is ranked #8 and likely should have Alex Gordon’s spot in left field. 

Bautista is ranked #11 and comes in ahead of Glen Allen’s Pablo Sandoval.  That might be surprising, as Sandoval has hit a league-leading .358 so far, which is 90 points higher than Bautista.  However, Bautista has a higher on base percentage due to his 63 extra walks.  Bautista also played nearly every day and has nearly 70 more plate appearances. 

In the end, the reality may just be that while Joey Bats is a good nickname, Kung Fu Panda is a great nickname.  It is the All-Star game and sometimes that makes all the difference.