I don't recall calling Kipnis an unworthy challenger. Perhaps saying Altuve is worthy doesn't imply that Kipnis is not.
More power, huh? If you're gonna throw that out there, give a gander to the Altuve dwarfing him in stolen bases. Like I said, my good friend is a Rays die hard and never mentions Forsythe. Should be indicative of why he ain't an all star. As much as you guys hate him, Altuve is world renowned and loved by all. Forsythe. Who the **** is that?
Travis and Zobrist have both been pretty good too, they just dont have enough at bats to be in the conversation.
I'm surprised that for fans of a team led by one of the most sabermetric and analytic front office in baseball still think of baseball in some of the most rudimentary, 1980s way of thinking, that I thought no longer existed in 2015. I'm not going to argue Forsythe over Altuve, but I wonder if we had Forsythe and the Rays had Altuve, what this page would look like. I'm going to guess it's not the "Forsythe is a joke Altuve for President" feel it currently has. Or if people honestly believe batting average and stolen bases (without accounting for caught stealing), are truly benchmark stats for player value.
1. Altuve (voted in) 2. Keuchel (should be a lock) 3. Harris (longshot, but we'll see) 4. Correa (honestly best SS in AL already, but I doubt he'll get recognized) I can see a AL all-star middle infield of Altuve and Correa for years to come!
If Springer had a better April, then MAYBE you could include him, but there's just too many good OFs.
That's also because Zobrist has played only 22 games at 2nd. How is he just as or even in the conversation of being worthy over Altuve?
Break even point for steals is about 75%. In other words, the positive value of a three steals is approximately wiped away for every caught stealing. Altuve's stolen base value would be about plus three steals when you take into account all the times he was caught. Not a big edge at all. Forsythe gets on base more (a.k.a. Altuve makes a lot more outs) and hits with slightly more authority this season. I think the All Star should only be based on the current season on what has happened (i.e. descriptive stats are more important than predictive stats in terms of describing what happened). I can see a reasonable argument for using the second half of the previous season. I am not of this opinion and my statements on All Star voting are only on current season data. If you are of the opinion that the second half of last season should count, please disregard my statements about Altuve.
Man....some fans just can't be satisfied. There are always complaints about the Astros not receiving national recognition. Altuve was probably propelled to be the starting second baseman based on the national perspective of him. Does he deserve to be the starter - yes. Does he deserve to be the starter over Kipnis - no. Altuve has his faults, but he is a productive player. The Astros do better when he is getting on base, similar to when Biggio played. Altuve is a catalyst. He is popular. He seems to be a good teammate. He plays hard. He seems to be a good guy. He represents the team, the city and Venezuela well. Enjoy him.
I agree with all of this. Other guys play hard as well and deserve to be recognized when they do. It is very weird going from being called a "homer" to not liking Altuve.
