THE WATERCOOLER

QUESTION: There are two spots remaining for the All-Star teams, one from the AL and one from the NL, and both will decided by online fan voting. The candidates for the AL are Ian Kinsler, Brandon Inge, Chone Figgins, Adam Lind and Carlos Pena. For the NL it’s Pablo Sandoval, Shane Victorino, Matt Kemp, Mark Reynolds and Christian Guzman. Who would you vote for in each league?

RICK HUMMEL
The 33rd player should be the last player into the game, but should be versatile enough to play more than one position. In the American League, that clearly is Chone Figgins, who can play infield or outfield. Not as easy in the National League, but Cristian Guzman, normally a shortstop, played third base quite well in extra innings in last year’s All-Star Game.

JEFF GORDON
For purely selfish reasons, I’d go with Kinsler, the Mizzou guy, and Pablo Sandoval. We need to get Kung Fu Panda at the Midsummer Classic. Not only can the Panda play, his infectious enthusiasm would help everybody have ever more fun. The All-Star Game is supposed to be fun, after all. He would be the player most likely to give us a John Kruk moment.

REID LAYMANCE
In the AL, I’ll take Chone Figgins because I like the way he plays and because colleague Roger Hensley says Chone will do an Ozzie Smith-style back flip on his way out to the field. In the NL, it’s Shane Victorino because we need the state of Hawaii to be represented here. He’s a true big-league “braddah” as the Hawaiian broadcasters call him.

LUKE THOMPSON
As far as the NL goes, this one’s pretty easy. Pablo Sandoval is fifth in the majors in batting average, and all four guys ahead of him were voted in as All-Star starters. In fact, the only reason I can see that Sandoval was left off in the first place is because the fans know David Wright a lot better (Sandoval is better in almost every offensive category) and third baseman Ryan Zimmerman had to fill the quota for the woeful Nationals.

In the AL, Kinsler hasn’t been able to hit for average since April, so it looks like a two-man race between Brandon Inge and Adam Lind. As much as I dislike the DH, I’m going to give the nod to Lind, who has the best balance of power and average and had an incredible June (.360, 7 HRs), even as the Blue Jays fell back to reality in the AL East.