Kyle Tucker of the Los Angeles Dodgers is one of a number of key star MLB players who will not be on the field when MLB plays its annual All-Star Game, this year in Philadelphia on July 14. (Photo by Katelyn Mulcahy/Getty Images)
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Major League Baseball’s All-Star ballot for the annual game this year at Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Park on July 14 is in circulation and the number of great players who won’t be there is already mindboggling.
This is by no means intended to be an exhaustive list, but let’s look at the particular cases of Aaron Judge, Cal Raleigh, Mookie Betts and Kyle Tucker. Their absence will place the focus on Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper, who have both been productive and will be there in what amounts to a Phillies home game. It also opens the rosters to other younger players.
Judge and Raleigh, who vied for the American League MVP last year with Yankees slugger Judge winning, are injured and out. Raleigh is hitting .161 with seven homers and 18 RBIs for the Mariners a year after shattering all records for a catcher and switch-hitter by hitting 60 homers.
There won’t be a repeat of Raleigh winning the Home Run Derby, which he did last year in Atlanta using his torpedo bat. Raleigh and those bats are yesterday’s stories.
“You don’t think you’re going to win it,” Raleigh said last July 25. “You don’t think you’re going to get invited, and then you’re invited. Then you win it with your family. It’s super special.”
Raleigh batted lefty in the Derby, facing pitches from his 58-year-old father, Todd, a right-hander, with his 15-year-old brother, Todd, Jr., catching.
Raleigh has a right oblique strain. He hit .220 with 30 homers and 100 RBIs in 2024, so all this may have some element of regression to the mean.
Judge, batting .248 with 17 homers and 31 RBIs, has a stress fracture of his first right rib, for the second time in his 11th season. Otherwise, he’s hitting well below his league-leading .331 batting average of last year when he also led in on-base percentage (.457), slugging percentage (.688), OPS (1.144) and OPS+ (.214). He hit 53 homers.
Even though he’s far below those historic numbers, he might still be elected to the team, but he won’t play in his eighth All-Star Game. After all, he’s Aaron Judge. The Yankees expect him to play sometime again this season, but there’s no timetable.
“I don't like talking timetables," Judge told reporters at Yankee Stadium on June 6. "That stuff's all made up. You never know what's going to happen."
Judge turned 34 in April and is starting to reach that age in baseball of natural decline much like Arizona’s Nolan Arenado (35) and San Diego’s Manny Machado (nearly 34). The two once-elite third basemen are hitting .248 and .178 respectively and aren’t going to Philadelphia, either.
Judge had a fractured right wrist in 2018 courtesy of being hit by a pitch that limited him to 112 games. He suffered a similar stress fracture to his right rib in 2020, a season shortened to 60 games because of COVID-19. He missed 42 games as recently as 2023 when he tore a ligament in his right big toe hitting the right-field fence while making a catch at Dodger Stadium.
Judge’s injuries have reached the proportions of Mickey Mantle, the former Yankees great and Hall of Famer who missed 127 games in his 18-year career dealing with various knee and leg injuries. Mantle always played hurt, which is what Judge tried to do after initially sustaining the injury while diving for a fly ball. Giancarlo Stanton and Max Fried are also on the Yanks’ injured list.
"Big G’s hurt. Max Fried’s hurt. We got a lot of guys banged up," Judge said. "You got to be out there. That’s what they’re paying me to do, is to go out there and play."
Judge appeared in 158 games and 152 games the past two years, both AL MVP seasons. But with only 59 games on the docket for the current season, the clock on his career is certainly ticking.
Betts and Tucker have been struggling this season for the two-time defending World Series champion Dodgers, who despite all that are in first place with a 44-26 record and hold a healthy eight-game lead over the Padres in the National League West.
Betts, now 33, joined the injured list on April 4 with a right oblique strain and didn’t return until May 11. After playing in 35 games, he hasn’t gotten untracked and is batting .181 with six homers, seven RBIs, a .591 OPS and a 65 OPS+, 35 points below the league average of 100. Now in his 13th season, Betts is hitting 107 points less than his .288 career average.
“He’s obviously just not comfortable in his swing or mechanics,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said recently about Betts. “He’s overthinking. Trying too hard. Very anxious. You can see him just fighting. That’s exactly where he’s at right now.”
Tucker, just 29, has been a complete enigma since signing a four-year, $240 million free-agent contract with the Dodgers this offseason. Betts had already been moved to shortstop when Tucker was awarded his old slot in right field.
As of this writing, Tucker’s slashing .234/.331/.377 with a .708 OPS, five homers, 34 RBIs and a 100 OPS+.
The Dodgers are paying Betts and Tucker a combined $87.6 million this season – Tucker $57.2 million and Betts $30.4 million – for this kind of production. Betts has six more years at that figure for luxury-tax purposes through 2032 when he’ll be 39, for a total of $182.4 million.
Tucker recently said he’s been searching for his swing all season, but whenever he’s had a little success he goes backward.
“I’m just trying to stay on the ball,” he noted. “Just trying to hit the ball to left center. Otherwise, it’s been great adjusting to the Dodgers. We have a really good team, a really great group of guys around us who want to help, get back to the World Series and win it. Every day we just show up, try to win the game and put in some good work.”
No pressure, but no All-Star appearance, either.
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