Why Paul Goldschmidt and Jake Lamb should be All-Stars
By Jeremy Henretta
There aren’t too many Diamondbacks worthy of the All-Star title this season, as the team’s 36-43 record would indicate. As is typically the case with Arizona, Paul Goldschmidt is an exception to this rule.
After getting off to a slow start to the season, Goldschmidt is currently on an offensive tear with a .395 batting average in his last 30 games played. He’s currently second among NL first basemen, sitting at .304, thus far.
He sits tied for fifth in home runs with 14, second in OPS at .958, and leads all major leaguers with a .436 on-base percentage and 63 walks. Goldy also tops all NL first baseman with 3.2 WAR, which places him third among all NL hitters.
Anthony Rizzo is the leading vote-getter at first base. He leads his position with 55 RBI, and is second with 18 dingers.
While this sort of dominance deserves a plethora of votes and a look at the possible starting role during this year’s mid-summer classic, I’m not convinced that Rizzo’s NL-leading 2,630,039 votes stack up fairly to Goldschmidt’s 977,889.
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This places him well behind at third place in the voting. “America’s First Baseman,” ironically, lacks the national notoriety of the beloved Cubs.
This situation is not a new one here in the desert, either. 2015 saw D-Backs fans make a turnaround with the #VoteGoldy push that saw him go from third place behind Rizzo and Dodgers first baseman Adrian Gonzalez, although that was much earlier in the voting than six days prior to the ballot conclusion.
Despite not leading the league in any major offensive category, Jake Lamb, who is actually leading the team in homers and RBI, deserves a serious look.
He ranks mostly in the top five in all important offensive categories at third base, placing him among baseball’s elites on the ho corner. Due to a heavily-stacked offensive class of third baseman, he lies on the fringes of a selection on this year’s NL roster.
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It’s a safe to bet to wager that Terry Collins, who is this year’s NL manager after leading the Mets to the 2015 World Series and ultimately losing to the Kansas City Royals in five games, will make a selection of Goldy as a reserve. Jake Lamb should be in the mix at third as well.