all star game

Hello baseball fans! We’re less than a week away from the All-Star game and the representatives for each league were announced yesterday. With this years selections, it again showcases a flawed system in which more deserving players don’t get to start when their numbers say otherwise.

Possibly the most glaring mistake made by fans is Cubs’ Addison Russell starting over Dodgers’ Corey Seager at SS for the National League. It just takes a quick glance at the numbers to see the wrong doing here. Seager’s hitting .304, with 17 HRs,41 RBIs with a NL SS leading 101 hits while Russell is hitting just .242, with 11 HRs, 49 RBIs, and only 66 hits. It is very clear who should be the starting SS for the NL next Tuesday but due to a system that relies on extremely biased fans, Seager will miss out on the starting job. Unfortunately for the rest of the NL this isn’t the only position that Cubs’ fans botched. They also made a mistake at second base by voting in Ben Zobrist to play second base. Now don’t get me wrong, I do believe that Zobrist should make the ASG, but Daniel Murphy should have ended up getting the starting job rather than the reserve role. Again, if people would have looked to the numbers during voting they would have seen that Murphy leads the NL in batting average at .349, has 14 HRs, along with 56 RBIs (leads all NL 2B). Zobrist falls short of Murphy in all those categories with a . 291 BA, 12 HRs, and 44 RBIs.

There was clearly a mistake made here and it comes down to uneducated or just ignorant fans. The Cubs have the best team that they’ve had in years and they actually have a realistic chance of making the World Series. With this in mind, they should have tried their best to lock up home field advantage by voting in the most deserving players to give the NL the best chance to win. With the last 4 out of 5 World Series titles going to the team with home field advantage, fans should take the voting much more serious if they really want to give their team the best chance to win a title.

As always I’d love to hear some feedback from you readers. You can reach me at fivepointfivehole@yahoo.com with questions, comments, or concerns. I’m always up for a baseball debate. Thanks as always for stopping by and don’t forget to check back soon to see what else is making it’s way through the five point five hole!

Hello baseball fans!

It’s official! Spring training is less than a month away and it’s becoming more and more clear which teams have the potential to compete. Before this off season it looked as if the Padres may be able to compete for a second wild card spot, however, now that the upcoming season can be seen with a touch more clarity, it looks like the dream of competing this year is slipping away. It’s not because GM A.J. Preller hasn’t done anything this off season (which he has, trading Craig Kimbrel for a huge haul of promising prospects, picking up a LHP in Drew Pomeranz at the cost of Yonder Alonso, dealing Gyorko to the Cardinals for Jon Jay, signing FA SS Alexei Ramirez, and just as recent as this morning filling the closer role with veteran CP Fernando Rodney) it’s more because of how much more the rest of the NL West has done. The D-Backs have seemed to have made the biggest splash thus far signing CY Young runner up Zach Grienke to a huge 6yr/$206.5 million deal, the Giants have brought in pitchers Jeff Samardzija and Johnny Cueto along with OF Denard Span, and as for the Dodgers… they are the Dodgers and are sure to compete. The bottom line is that it appears the Padres won’t be big factors in the NL West but there’s always the hope that the Padres turn into that one team that come out of nowhere to shock everyone.

Although it does not appear the Padres will be bringing playoffs to Petco Park this year, it will still be a very exciting time with everything going on. The biggest being the All-Star game which makes it’s return to San Diego for the first time in twenty-four years. On top of the mid summer classic, the Padres also have a brand new look which includes commemorative All-Star season home jerseys, a new blue and yellow hat, new navy camouflage jerseys, and, my personal favorite, the return of the brown jerseys which will be worn on every Friday home game. The excitement does not end there however, as this years draft looks to add quite a bit of talent to the Padres organization with the friars having six picks out of the top 100.

Regardless of how the Padres season goes, this is an exciting time in San Diego and with the youth of the players they have now its only going to get better from here. So to my local readers do me and our Padres a favor. Show up. Be loud. Cheer for this team like it’s the only pro team left in our city because it could become that any day now. This is an organization that is trying now and as a fan base we should too.

Thanks as always for reading and don’t forget to check back to see what else is making it’s way through the five point five hole!

Fivepointfive

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