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Pittsburgh Pirates 2015 All Star Update II

By Jason Rollison

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The Pittsburgh Pirates may find themselves with a lone position player on the 2015 all-star team.

Or they may find themselves with no starters in the midsummer classic at all. Here now is the second all-star game voting update from MLB:

Compared to last week’s tally of 339,566 votes, Andrew McCutchen made a huge jump, nearly doubling his vote and gaining 328,126 tallies in the process. He moved up three spots in the outfield voting, to the eighth-highest tally, up from his previous ranking of 11. Of course, when you have a week like McCutchen had this past week, it almost is surprising that he didn’t climb even higher. In the last 7 days, Cutch is hitting .542/.567/.833, going an astounding 13-for-24 with seven RBI. The scary thing for those teams facing the Pittsburgh Pirates is that he is showing no signs of slowing down, as his 4-for-5 night in last night’s win illustrates.

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Looking at the rest of the Pirates roster, there is one other obvious All-Star who will be there in Cincinnati later this summer. Gerrit Cole leads the majors in wins with eight, with a scant 1.90 ERA to go along with 79 strikeouts (a 10.0 Strikeout-per-nine innings ratio). At this point, he is simply jockeying to potentially start the game, as it would take a monumental collapse or injury for him to not be selected.

Tony Watson, carrying a microscopic 0.62 ERA since his Opening Day struggle, also figures to be a lock to earn his second consecutive All-Star nod. After Watson, the waters are considerably murkier, with Jung Ho Kang being a dark horse candidate should he mobilize his international fanbase. Starling Marte‘s hot start made him a viable candidate, yet his recent struggles may have curtailed his hopes. Still, with a well-timed hot streak and consistent hitting, he may be in position to be named to the team by the end of June.

We will continue to analyze the voting with each subsequent update.

Next: McCutchen drives Pirates to a 7-4 win over the Giants

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