Major League Baseball

10 potential first-time All-Stars

Published May. 29, 2013 1:00 a.m. ET

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Matt Harvey will be an All-Star.

He’s the talk of baseball. He pitches for the New York Mets, who will host the MLB All-Star Game on FOX July 16 at Citi Field. He allowed only one earned run over eight innings against the Yankees on Tuesday night, lowering his ERA to 1.85.

Harvey could pitch left-handed for the entirety of June and still be named to Bruce Bochy’s National League staff.

To have tabbed the 24-year-old as an All-Star during spring training would have been bold. To do it now is a formality. So, this column won’t be about Matt Harvey.

This column belongs to Jason Grilli and Chris Davis, to Josh Donaldson and Jean Segura, to players having breakout and/or career years whose names you may not have known when the season began.

Rosters for the Midsummer Classic will be named in less than six weeks, so it’s time to become familiar with these potential All-Stars. You don’t want to be the only person in the living room bellowing, "WHO’S THAT?!" when Joe Buck announces one or more of them during pregame introductions.

A worthwhile debate persists about whether the All-Star Game should showcase the game’s brightest stars or merely those players who enjoyed the best first halves. I am in the former camp. But I also believe there must be room for some charming stories fans don’t know already.

Here are some under-the-radar candidates to make the first All-Star appearances of their careers this July. A degree of obscurity — however subjectively defined — is required to appear here. (For example, Shin-Soo Choo belongs in a separate discussion: He’s never been an All-Star despite an exceptional career OPS-plus of 134, but the money he’s about to earn as a free agent won’t be described as “unheralded.”)

Jason Grilli, Pirates

Grilli isn’t merely leading the majors in saves with 21. He’s having a historic season.

The Pirates named the 36-year-old as their closer even though he never had done the job before. Despite making more than 300 major league appearances entering this year, he recorded no more than two saves in a given season.

Now, according to STATS LLC, the single-season saves record for a pitcher of that statistical background belongs to . . . Jason Grilli.

This, from a pitcher who on Tuesday told me, “I should’ve been out of the game a long time ago.” He underwent two elbow surgeries — a screw insertion in 2000, Tommy John in 2002 — before a severe hamstring injury in 2010 put his career in jeopardy and forced him to undergo extensive knee surgery. Grilli compares the right side of his body to “aisle 14 at Home Depot” because of all the hardware used to patch up his body.

At last, Grilli is pitching at the back end of a big-league bullpen, the goal he set for himself when the Colorado Rockies — then managed by Clint Hurdle — acquired him from Detroit in 2008.

“The story’s not finished,” said Hurdle, now Grilli’s manager in Pittsburgh. “A lot of the big questions over the winter — from all the skeptics — have been answered. A lot of people who weren’t on the bandwagon now have gotten on the bandwagon, which is kind of the way, unfortunately, the sport works. Nobody had ever done it at his age, gotten their first opportunity.”

Chris Davis, Orioles

Name a star first baseman: Joey Votto, Prince Fielder, Adrian Gonzalez, Paul Goldschmidt, or the former MVPs Albert Pujols, Justin Morneau and Ryan Howard.

All of them trail Davis in OPS this season. Davis leads the majors with 17 home runs and would be atop every American League Triple Crown category if it weren’t for a certain Detroit third baseman.

Jean Segura, Brewers

Segura looks like a bona fide star, less than one year after the Brewers acquired him from the Angels in the Zack Greinke trade. He leads the National League in batting average, and his .969 OPS ranks second only to Troy Tulowitzki among major league shortstops.

Segura, 23, is on pace for a 20/20 season, at the very least. He already has hit eight home runs and has swiped 14 bases.

Josh Donaldson, Athletics

Drafted as a catcher by the Chicago Cubs in 2007, Donaldson was a second-string third baseman at this time last year. He appeared in only four games with Oakland last June — three at catcher, one at first base.

Suffice it to say, he’s an everyday player now. Miguel Cabrera is the only third baseman with a higher OPS than Donaldson’s .964. And Donaldson ranks among the majors’ top 10 position players in WAR, according to FanGraphs.com.

Brandon Crawford, Giants

The reason Crawford is listed here isn't because his manager in San Francisco is likely to select him for the National League team. Crawford belongs in the All-Star Game because he has become one of the best two-way shortstops in the game.

Once, Crawford’s bat was seen as a liability. No more. His .810 OPS is fifth among qualifying shortstops in the major leagues, and his brilliant defense was a key factor in the Giants’ victory over Detroit in the World Series last year.

Sean Doolittle, Athletics

Donaldson’s catcher-to-third base switch seems boring in comparison to Doolittle, a first baseman and right fielder in the Oakland farm system from 2007-09. He arrived in the majors last year at age 25 . . . as a left-handed reliever.

Doolittle is hardly a situational lefty for the seventh inning. He has faced more right-handers than left-handers this season, and righties have fared even worse — a .102 average, compared with .143.

Carlos Gomez, Brewers

Gomez is an unlikely darling for the sabermetric community, having walked only 25 times in more than 600 plate appearances with the Minnesota Twins in 2008. He still doesn’t walk much — only nine times this year — but his power has increased so much that he ranks first among major league position players in WAR, according to FanGraphs.com.

I had my doubts when the Brewers signed him to a three-year, $24 million contract extension in spring training. His .597 slugging percentage in center field says I was wrong.

Evan Gattis, Braves

If the All-Star Game is a place for the game’s best stories, then Gattis will be there. Depression and substance abuse sidetracked Gattis’ career, and he worked as a ski-lift operator among other odd jobs. But he returned to the sport and posted massive power numbers in the Braves’ farm system over the past two seasons. He made the Opening Day roster this year, thanks to a big spring and Brian McCann’s recovery from shoulder surgery.

McCann is back, but Gattis has played so well that the Braves had little choice but to keep him. He has 12 home runs, and who wouldn’t want to see him pinch hit against Mariano Rivera in the ninth inning of the All-Star Game?

Matt Carpenter, Cardinals

Carpenter is the embodiment of the Cardinals’ grinding ethic, right down to his no-batting-gloves look. He has started regularly at second base and third base, more recently filling in at first base and right field. And he hits wherever he plays, with a .309 batting average, .850 OPS, and almost as many walks as strikeouts.

Yadier Molina is the only Cardinals player who has been more productive than Carpenter this year. The argument could be made that Molina is the only Cardinals player who has been more valuable, too.

Starling Marte, Pirates

Marte told me Tuesday that he set the All-Star Game as his goal before the season began. He could make it happen, with an OPS above .800 and 13 stolen bases despite a recent slump. Hurdle believes Marte will become a 20-homer hitter “with age, maturity and experience,” and Pittsburgh teammate Brandon Inge said, “He could have the type of career like Torii Hunter.”

“Marte has, over 50 games, given us everything we could hope to have in a leadoff hitter,” Hurdle said. “He’s not your prototypical leadoff man. He’s more of a slasher. But his discipline has improved at the plate.

“He’s got a chance to be a very good player — and better than that, because he has all five tools. He’s a legitimate five tools.”

And five-tool players are best showcased in the All-Star Game, whether you already know their names or not.

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