Yes, I voted for Zack Cozart

Phil Gurnee ♦ June 9, 2017 ♦ 2 Comments

It wasn’t even a hard decision. I had hoped it would be but by any account, Zack Cozart has been the best shortstop in baseball this year and thus the vote was easy.  

Sure, if I had to draft a team I would draft Cory Seager over Zack Cozart and maybe that is what the all-star game is for many fans. For me, it is a huge % of what you are doing the year you are being voted.

Cozart has always been a great defensive shortstop but for whatever reason (Chris Taylor anyone?) his offense has exploded this year. I don’t vote early anymore, I learned my lesson with 2005 Izturis but I think by June I can vote. I fully expected Cosart to have a huge slump in May and Seager to surge but instead, Cozart continued to pound the ball and Seager had a bit of a misstep in May and most of June until his key home run on Wednesday.

I will admit to one other strange vote. I voted for Matt Kemp. I’ve decided going forward I’ll allow myself one sentimental vote if the player is having any kind of year. Since Matt Kemp is getting lots of votes and is having an excellent offensive season I decided to use my sentimental vote on Kemp.  He’s not Conforto, or Duvall, or Ozuna but he’ll do.

I never expected to be voting for Yonder Alonso but he really does have the highest fWAR for 1st baseman in the AL. His competition was Marwin Gonzalez and Logan Morrison??????? What the hell happened to Miggy/Abreu/Pujols/C Davis/C Santana/Hosmer?

Here we go:

American League:

1st – Yonder Alonso
2nd – Jose Altuve
SS – Carlos Correa
3B – Miguel Sano
C – Salvador Perez
OF – Mike Trout, Aaron Judge, George Springer

National League:
1st – Ryan Zimmerman
2nd – Daniel Murphy
SS – Zack Cozart
3B – I did vote for Nolan Arenado – I may have bent over too far in trying to be objective but I just find his defense so dazzling. Turner missed to much time and is a good 100 PA behind his competition of Arenado and Byrant. I may have gone with Anthony Rendon as my 2nd choice.
Catcher – Posey
OF – Harper, Blackmon, Kemp

1st and 3rd base are beasts in the NL. At 1st the options are Goldy, Votto, Thames, and Bour. Plus, Freddie Freeman was better than all of them.  At 3rd the options are Rendon/Turner/Byrant/ Suarez/Lamb

I expect Cory Seager to make the team either by getting the vote or being selected. I hope Grandal gets selected, he deserves to go.  I think the injury to Turner keeps him from making the team.

Kershaw and Jansen have to go.