Cubs and Royals fans rocking All-Star vote, but here's why you shouldn't freak out

Major League Baseball has revealed its first update on the All-Star balloting tallies (AL | NL) and, as is the case every year, there's screaming from the masses about how stupid it is to let the fans vote. This time around, much of the venom will be centered on Royals and Cubs fans.

But should it be? Let's examine.

The current Royals slated to start are Eric Hosmer (1B), Salvador Perez (C) and Lorenzo Cain (OF). All can easily be justified. Sure, you could argue for other players, but there isn't anything egregious here in the least. Also consider the Royals are in first place and the defending World Series champions and this is mostly a case of people worried about a repeat of last year, I think.

Then again, last year eventually turned out OK and we'll get to that.

For now, onto the Cubs.

The current Cubs slated to start: Anthony Rizzo (1B), Ben Zobrist (2B), Kris Bryant (3B), Addison Russell (SS) and Dexter Fowler (OF).

Will Rizzo, Zobrist and Bryant all start the All-Star Game? USATSI

So that's five of eight. Well, five of 10 once the DH and starting pitcher are chosen -- neither of which would likely come from the Cubs.

Would having half the starters come from a team that is 4 1/2 games better than the second-best in the league really that bad? I'd submit that no, it's not.

Consider that the Cubs are the best team in baseball -- and, no, it's not even close -- burst onto the scene last year with a young and fun team and dominated offseason headlines. They haven't slowed down. Is it really surprising they are dominating the fan vote? Nope.

Individually, you could argue over Rizzo (Paul Goldschmidt), Bryant (Nolan Arenado -- though I think Bryant has just as strong an argument) and Russell.

Let's dive in there. That's the bad one. Russell is hitting .241/.333/.371 with excellent defense through Wednesday's action. It's a defense-first position and he looks the part there, but offensively he's been outperformed by Brandon Crawford of the Giants and Crawford is also a great defender. What about Dodgers rookie Corey Seager (.277/.332/.469 with nine homers, 27 RBI and 33)? He's the best pick here.

Let us also mention this position is screwed up in balloting anyway since Cardinals rookie Aledmys Diaz (.328/.361/.539 with seven homers, 26 RBI and 36 runs) was left off. No write-in candidate has a shot to win, so this messes things up.

As for Trevor Story, he's hitting .244 with a .310 OBP and 61 strikeouts against 15 walks since the middle of April. At this rate, we'd be sending Chris Shelton to start the All-Star Game.

So, really, pick someone else at shortstop in the NL and we're probably OK. Arenado likely needs the nod at NL DH, so both he and Bryant would start anyway. Goldy can take over for Rizzo in the fourth inning, just as Daniel Murphy could take over for Zobrist at second.

Now, the down ballot stuff is what concerns people the most, in my opinion, and it should. We're definitely in the danger zone.

What's funny is that last year when it looked like the Royals might have eight AL starters next to Mike Trout, I wrote the following:

I had the pleasure of being in Wrigley Field Friday and I posed the question to a few Cubs fans:
What if Miguel Montero started the All-Star Game over Buster Posey?
One response I got perfectly sums it up:
"I'd be embarrassed."

Uh oh. Miguel Montero is third in the NL catcher vote behind Yadier Molina and Buster Posey. If that changed and Montero took over, it would be a major problem consider Montero is only the second-best catcher on his own team behind a soon-to-be-retired man they call Grandpa (and in no way am I mocking David Ross -- he's having an excellent season).

Jason Heyward is fourth in NL outfielders while slashing .222/.321/.287. Yuck. He's the best corner outfield defender in baseball, but he's been hurting them, badly, offensively. Jorge Soler is sixth. He's hitting .202/.302/.361 and he's not a good defender. The good news is they aren't really close to the top three, but the bad news is they lead the likes of Andrew McCutchen, Starling Marte, Stephen Piscotty, Gregory Polanco, Christian Yelich, Marcell Ozuna and many more.

Again, NL voting totals here.

Back to the Royals, there are similar issues. Mike Moustakas is worse than Josh Donaldson at just about everything, but he's leading the 2015 AL MVP in voting. With Moustakas out for the season now, maybe those votes shift to worthy leader Manny Machado, Donaldson, breakouts Nick Castellanos and Travis Shaw or standbys Adrian Beltre and Kyle Seager.

At short, luckily Xander Bogaerts is ahead of Alcides Escobar, but it's too close for comfort. Indians star Francisco Lindor, who is better at everything than Escobar (yes, even defense, Royals fans), isn't even in the top five.

Francisco Lindor deserves more run in fan voting. USATSI

At DH, somehow Kendrys Morales has more votes than Victor Martinez and Nelson Cruz -- not that it matters since David Ortiz is rightfully running away with it.

And then in the outfield, Alex Gordon is sixth and Paulo Orlando is eighth. Those are too high and Gordon's within striking range of third.

And holy hell look at second base. Omar Infante is in second place. He's losing playing time to Whit Merrifield and Christian Colon. When Infante does play, there's an argument to be made that he's the worst regular starter in the AL. He's leading early MVP candidate Robinson Cano in votes, not to mention Dustin Pedroia and Ian Kinsler.

Again, AL voting totals here.

Back to that Montero quote above, it would be "embarrassing" to see some of these Cubs/Royals win the vote, especially Montero and Infante.

That quote was from an entire article where I said the collective voting bloc going crazy over the Royals was embarrassing itself and I stand by that. At the time, that was true.

I've also learned my lesson and am inclined to wait this time around. After all, a few weeks later I was writing about how the process ended up being "just the right amount of Royal." I wrote this:

I've seen some in the media say things -- and this will continue into Monday morning -- like, "see, the outcry was all for nothing." I disagree. Vehemently, in fact. I would argue that with all the updates and outrage among media and non-Royals fans alike, this caused an uprising of support for the more-worthy candidates in Cabrera, Donaldson, Altuve and Cruz. The tipping point was when the Royals moved into position everywhere but over Mike Trout. Ever since then, the votes were shifting away from the Royals. Had there not been weekly updates, we may well have seen the Royals take eight of the nine AL spots while the other fan bases just went along with more important daily matters.
Instead, the national and regional pushback resulted in things evening out.

Again, I stand by this sentiment and I believe that we'd be wise to let the process play out before kicking and screaming -- especially about guys who aren't in position to start like Infante, Escobar, Montero, Heyward and Soler.

Further, check the voting numbers from last year's first update to the final tallies. Through the first AL update last year, there were nine players with at least one million votes. Eleven players ended up with more than 10 million votes when the dust settled. The leaderboard shuffled frequently within the updates for weeks. On the NL side there were far fewer votes (due to KC rocking the vote and the subsequent backlash to said rocking of the vote), but the increase on a percentage basis was similar.

Basically, we're talking about millions and millions of votes still yet to come this summer on this matter. Let's not take the first ballot update -- notably the down-ballot issues -- as some sort of referendum on the voting process.

As the summer picks up, more fans will start paying attention to baseball and start voting. Remember, there are people occupied with the NBA Finals and Stanley Cup Finals in their spare time while having real-life things going on -- especially those with kids finishing up the school year and playing sports like baseball. As we move closer to July, the vote totals will pile up and things just might even out -- especially with the backlash against the Royals and Cubs in the early voting.

The Royals and Cubs both deserve to be heavily represented in the All-Star Game, but not to overrun it. In all likelihood, that's how it's going to end up. We can all be part of the process by going to vote for the deserving players (PLEASE VOTE if you want to have a say and PLEASE do your homework -- we're in this together).

If we do end up with something like 15 of the 17 ballot winners being from the Royals and Cubs then, yes, we need to discuss scrapping the fan vote. I'd support freaking out, too.

Until the final results are revealed, however, let's learn our lesson from last season and not freak out.