Domenic Vadala: Properly aligning baseball's All-Stars

There's been a lot of talk lately about the voting process for the upcoming All-Star Game, and how the Kansas City Royals are monopolizing it. I've written about it on Birds Watcher, you've heard about it here on MASNsports.com, and as well on numerous other outlets. Let me be only the latest person to say that the entire scenario is a poor one - both for players and for baseball as a whole.

There's a part of me that does, however, see the point that the Royals fans aren't doing anything against the rules. But are they really doing the rules justice? Yes and no, in a sense. It's so easy to look at a fan base and suggest that they shouldn't simply vote their own guys across the board. But would the rest of us not do the same?

But there does seem to be a bit of inadequacy in this entire process, evidenced by Major League Baseball throwing out 60 million or so votes last week. There are all kinds of stories out there about people cheating the system by relying on bots to vote on their behalf numerous times. However I'm not going to allege that. I don't know enough about computers to know if that's even possible or if it's happened.

But what I do know is that six or seven guys starting from one team, most of whom don't deserve to be there, isn't a good scenario for baseball. So how does this affect the Orioles? Well, the one Oriole who I think could have a legitimate case for being a starter might be Adam Jones. And as it stands now, Mike Trout is the leading candidate in center field - and that one, folks, appears to be legitimate.

But also keep in mind that in the latest vote totals, Jones moved down from fifth to seventh in the balloting. Jones is an All-Star; no ifs, ands or buts about it. But at the end of the day, will he be an All-Star? Manny Machado is fifth in the voting at third base, with Kansas City's Mike Moustakas at the top. Granted, Moustakas gets on base frequently, but are his six home runs really All-Star starter-worthy?

Ultimately, I think Josh Donaldson should be the starting third baseman, but that's just my view. However, Omar Infante, Alex Rios, Kendrys Morales and others shouldn't be starters - they just shouldn't be. Royals fans will argue that nobody else voted, and they might be right. But baseball is very much about what's right for the game. So is this right for the game?

And the answer is, of course, it's not. And that's true especially in this era where the All-Star Game actually does have meaning. The Orioles have as good a chance as anyone to reach the World Series. So what happens if they make it there and a star-studded National League team laid the woodwork to a starting American League team full of role players from the Kansas City Royals in the first couple of innings of the All-Star Game?

Ultimately at the end of the day, me using the bully pulpit here isn't going to change anything. As I've said, I do understand the point that the Kansas City fans are supposedly not doing anything wrong. However, my hope, and that of a lot of people, is that the league takes this to heart and changes the process.

Orioles fans could have done the same thing that Kansas City fans did in this case - they either didn't have the yearn or they chose to vote for other players. I can tell you that I voted the maximum amount of times allowed, although I won't say for whom I voted. My voice is in there someplace.

The decision should be made based on the opinions of baseball people. In this case, Kansas City manager Ned Yost will also be managing the team. However, I would trust a baseball person to decide who's truly an All-Star and who should start more so than I would your run-of-the-mill fan. That sounds harsh, but it's probably true.

Keep in mind that many players have bonuses in their contracts if they make the All-Star team. So while nobody's going to feel bad that a millionaire doesn't get more money, would you be happy if you knew that people not involved in your field were deciding who got a bonus and who didn't?

Domenic Vadala blogs about the Orioles at Birds Watcher, and his opinions appear here as part of MASNsports.com's season-long initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our pages. Follow him on Twitter: @DomenicVadala. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers.