All Star Balloting Shocker Has Ketel Marte in Tight Race

Arizona Diamondbacks star second baseman Ketel Marte is currently in second place on the NL All-Star ballot for second basemen. He trails Luis Arraez by less than 4,300 votes and has 608,807 total votes upon the latest update on voting totals.

Arizona Diamondbacks fans will need to come out in droves on their mobile devices and laptops to vote Marte to the All-Star Game and to be the starting second baseman for the National League for the second time in his career. It would be the first time since 2019 for him.

Marte is deserving of being voted into the next phase of the All-Star Ballot Voting and is deserving of winning second base outright over the Padres Arraez.

The San Diego Padres had to move Arraez off of second base and to first base because of how bad his defense has been this year. He now plays first base more than second base.

That's a whole reason in itself as to why Marte should be the second base starter, he still plays at second base. Plus, he's shaping up to be a Gold Glove winner at second base.

Ketel Marte is hitting .283/.348/.504/ .852 OPS. Arraez is batting .326/.361/.389/ .749 OPS. Marte's power and ability to draw walks far outweighs the singles-heavy approach of Luis Arraez. This is evidenced by the over 100 point gap in OPS.

Ketel Marte has 15 doubles, two triples, 14 homers, 39 RBI, three stolen bases, and leads the NL in sacrifice flies with six. Arraez has 90 hits to Marte's 78. However, he has only 14 doubles, one triple, one home run, and 18 RBI. Marte has 28 walks to Arraez 12, making up for the small gap in hits. numbers simply don't compare to Marte's in terms of run scoring value.

Arraez relies on making soft contact and getting on base via the single more often than not. This is a fine skill, but it limits his ability to impact the offense. Marte, meanwhile, has been lacing extra-base hits all season and is slugging over .500.

So far, in 14 games in June, Marte is slashing .360/.468/.640/1.108 with two doubles, four homers, 10 RBIs with 10 walks to only 10 strikeouts. Marte has 49 runs while the other has 41. The stats are endless as to how Ketel Marte needs to be voted into the All-Star Game.

With RISP, Marte has a .738 OPS with 16 hits, 23 RBI, 11 walks, and 12 strikeouts in 65 at-bats. He has been Arizona's best clutch hitter. In High Leverage situations, Marte is hitting .359 with a 1.070 OPS.

As mentioned above Marte is having a Gold Glove Caliber season. He leads all National League players with 11 defensive runs saved. That combination of offense and defense has resulted in him ranking not only atop the WAR table among second baseman, but first in the NL among ALL players with 4.0 Baseball Reference WAR. The one dimensional Arraez meanwhile has just 0.8 bWAR

If you agree, vote for Ketel Marte and the rest of the Diamondbacks here. The Arizona Diamondbacks and their players appreciate your support and help in getting Ketel Marte to Texas for the All-Star Game.