I don't know if you're big on Twitter--more specifically, big on manufactured Twitter hashtags--but if you are, you've noticed that the 2012 MLB All-Star Game's Final Vote has developed some weird electoral-politics-style twitches. More specifically still, St. Louis Cardinals third baseman David Freese and Chicago White Sox pitcher Jake Peavy have joined forces on a single ticket, with #TakeJake and #FreesePlease the chosen hashtags to promote their joint venture.
↵Peavy's a deserving all-star and Freese isn't, so I guess they have some synergies that could be exploited in a national campaign, but I'm not sure James Carville would recommend us taking two candidates out of the Midwest. A younger, more exciting candidate, like a Bryce Harper, probably would have done a better job of balancing Peavy's comebacky-veteran vibe.
↵Some people have used this as an avenue to talk about how ridiculous the All-Star Game voting has gotten, and it has. But that's actually what I like about this--it's honest. The majority of All-Star Game voters aren't making their votes because they think they know who the best players are, they're doing it because they like certain players, because their favorite team tells them to, because they get caught up in the fun of the process. And that's all right, especially when it's transparent like this; if it were always more transparent, we wouldn't be stuck with the All-Star Game deciding home-field advantage in the World Series.
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