We’ve all seen and talked about Trevor Story‘s ability to hit the ball, but what about his defense?
Story, who leads all shortstops with 21 homers and is tied for second with Boston Red Sox’s shortstop Xander Bogaerts with 56 RBIs is a better fielder than he get’s credit for.
Not only should Story have started in the All Star game for the NL over Chicago Cubs shortstop Addison Russell — who’s hitting .237 with 11 home runs and 51 RBIs — because of his offensive prowess, but because of his defensive abilities, too.
The argument against Story’s All-Star candidacy has been this: Yes, he’s the best offensive shortstop in the National League, but he’s not the defender that a guy like Russell is.
That’s simply not true.
Story has a better fielding percentage (.975) this season than Russell (.971), the same amount of errors (9) and 36 more assists than Russell. He also has eight more putouts than the NL starting shortstop. Story does have more chances than Russell (356 to 308), but, with the same amount of errors, it shows Russell is more prone to making a mistake in the field than Story is.
It’s hard to make a case that Story shouldn’t have been the starting shortstop at this year’s All-Star game; it’s even harder to say that he shouldn’t have made the team at all.
Brandon Crawford, who’s backing up Russell, is the superior fielder to both Story and Russell, posting a .989 fielding percentage and only committing four errors in the same amount of chances as Story(356). He’s tallied five more putouts than Story, but again is tied with him when it comes to assists in the field (243).
Again, though, when you look at the offensive numbers, Story is right there.
Everybody knows the Cubs are much more popular than the Rockies and so are the Giants, but when is the MLB going to realize that the best players need to be playing on baseball’s second biggest stage? The first, of course, being the World Series.
This is the All Star game, where the world’s best players come together to play an actually meaningful game that determines home-field advantage in the World Series.
The league can’t afford to have fans of a team like the Cubs, who at the moment are most likely baseball’s most-popular team, determine the outcome of this game. All Cubs fans want to see is the Cubs, so it isn’t surprising to see that the team swept the votes on the infield and have five starters in the lineup come first pitch.
Yes, some of their players deserve to be starting or at least on the roster, but Story has had a better season than Russell thus far, and it’s time for the MLB to step in and put the players most deserving of a roster spot on the team.
In Story’s case, he should be on the roster without a doubt. He will most likely win NL rookie of the year and tied Dave Kingman and Albert Pujols for the most home runs for a rookie (21) before the All-Star break.
Not only is he the best offensive shortstop in baseball, but his defense is underrated severely. Is he Tulo in his prime? No. But any liabilities he may have in the field certainly aren’t large enough to be used as an excuse for why he’s not in tonight’s game.