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The Rays have the best record in baseball, and they have been rewarded with more than one All-Star for only the second time in their history.
Catcher Dioner Navarro and left-hander Scott Kazmir will represent the Rays at Yankee Stadium on July 15—and they may be joined by Evan Longoria.
Navarro, a first-time selection, has been among the most productive catchers in the league both offensively and defensively. He’s hitting .318 with 14 doubles, four homers and 33 RBIs, and has thrown out 38.1 percent of runners attempting to steal against him—the best percentage in the American League and second-best in baseball.
“I know everybody looks at the batting average, but that, to me, is secondary,” said Rays manager Joe Maddon. “You look at our team ERA – his game-calling has gotten a lot better, and blocking the ball he’s been spectacular.”
Kazmir, who also was an All-Star in 2006, is 7-3 with a 2.63 ERA in 12 starts after opening the season on the disabled list. Opponents have hit only .204 against him and he has struck out 75 batters in 72 innings.
Kazmir was voted in via the player balloting, while Navarro was selected by AL manager Terry Francona.
“That was a big thing, just to know that your peers really respect your game and voted you in like that,” Kazmir said. “That means the most to me.”
Longoria is one of five players in the running for the 32nd and final spot on the AL team, with the winner to be selected in online balloting this week. Longoria is up against Jason Giambi, Jermaine Dye, Jose Guillen and Brian Roberts, so that’ll be a tough sell. Voting is open now on MLB.com and continues through 5 p.m. ET Thursday.
“Just to be included in that list of names is awesome,” said Longoria, who then admitted he would vote for himself and guessed his mom back in California already had spent a good hour voting for him as well.
Kazmir said he wasn’t necessarily disappointed the Rays didn’t have more representatives.
“As long as there’s more than one, we’re fine with that,” he said. “There’s a lot of guys here that really deserve to be a part of it, and we have Longoria still up for the ballot, so we’re going to make a push for him to play in New York.”
The only other time the Rays have had more than one All-Star was 1999, when Jose Canseco and Roberto Hernandez were selected. A back injury kept Canseco from attending the game.
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Posted by Casey, Bradenton on 07/07 at 12:51 AM
Congratulations to Kaz and Navi, but once again MLB reminds us we are the Rays by picking only two Tampa Bay players for the All-STar game despite the best record in Baseball. Longo
should be on the team over Joe Crede, and I hope Aki, Sonny and C.C. received due consideration. There have been several times when Rays players should have been named: Rocco’s rookie year,
the year Zambrano won 9 before the All-Star game, another year Huff had better stats then several players, and Crawford before. I don’t blame Francona,
I blame Bud and his henchmen.