Biggest Winners and Losers of the 2024 MLB All-Star Rosters

The full rosters for the 2024 MLB All-Star Game are here and, at least for now, are final.

It's therefore time to partake in an annual tradition: Discussing the biggest winners and losers from the setting of said rosters.

Everyone should know how this works, but anyone who doesn't can relax. It's all very simple. "Winners" are players and/or teams whose All-Star news is worth clapping for. "Losers" is not an insult, but rather meant to address those whose news deserves jeers.

Keep in mind that the 32-man rosters for the American League and National League squads are final until they're not. Injuries and other forces will inevitably get more players invited to Globe Life Field for the Midsummer Classic on July 16.

In the meantime, let the praising and ranting begin.

The Phillies boast MLB's best record at 58-32, so you might say them ending up with ample All-Star representation was a fait accompli.

But there's "ample," and then there's "historic."

Between starters Bryce Harper, Trea Turner and Alec Bohm and pitchers Ranger Suárez, Zack Wheeler, Matt Strahm and Jeff Hoffman, the Phillies have seven players on the initial National League roster. It's the most of any team in the majors and, as noted by Jayson Stark of The Athletic, one shy of the expansion-era record for a single team.

There otherwise remains a good All-Star case for lefty starter Cristopher Sánchez, who has a 2.96 ERA. There's also a one for righty reliever Orion Kerkering, who, like Strahm and Hoffman, has an ERA in the 1.00s through 31 appearances. And for designated hitter Kyle Schwarber, who has 17 home runs in addition to an NL-high 59 walks.

And as such, the Phillies may yet be able to tie or even break the aforementioned record.

This is nothing against Shōta Imanaga, who absolutely deserves to be an All-Star representative for the Cubs.

Though "The Throwing Philosopher" has stumbled since posting a 0.84 ERA through nine starts, he still bears a solid 3.16 ERA to go with an NL-low rate of 1.5 walks per nine innings. He's also in the discussion for the most purely entertaining pitchers in baseball today.

Yet it's not a good look for the Cubs that Imanaga is their one and only All-Star.

They do, after all, have the sixth-highest payroll in MLB at $235.5 million. And it's not as if their roster is short on All-Star types. Cody Bellinger, Dansby Swanson, Ian Happ and Justin Steele have all been there before.

Yet such is life when a team is 42-49 and in last place in its division. It's a disappointment so significant that it's only appropriate that disappointment would infect every aspect of the Cubs' season.

Based on what he's done in 2024, Seth Lugo being named an All-Star is arguably the least surprising thing that happened on Sunday.

If it feels like he leads MLB pitchers in, well, everything, it's because he kinda-sorta does. To select just a few notable numbers, his 11 wins, 2.21 ERA, 122 innings and 193 ERA+ are tops among his mound-bound peers.

Still, it's never not a cool story whenever a guy makes his first All-Star roster in his age-34 season. And then there's how Lugo got here.

His pro career began in earnest when the New York Mets selected him in the 34th round with the 1,032nd overall pick in the 2011 draft. Unless you're a big Mike McCoy fan, it's hard to say that spot in the draft is a hotbed for talent. Indeed, it doesn't even exist anymore.

For now, at least, Lugo's All-Star selection is the culmination of a true underdog story. All of the congratulations are in order.

Speaking of cool All-Star stories, Erick Fedde joining Lugo on the American League pitching staff would have also qualified.

Alas, it didn't happen.

Not unexpected, perhaps, but still an outrage on account of how only Lugo and fellow AL All-Star Tyler Anderson have produced more wins above replacement than Fedde in 2024. The 3.13 ERA he has over 106.1 innings is solid in a vacuum, and that much more so in context of how hitter-friendly Guaranteed Rate Field has played this year.

Unlike Lugo, Fedde is a former first-rounder who was a regular in top-100 lists in the 2010s. Yet this didn't prove to be a road to a charmed big league life, as his initial exposure to the majors saw him bomb so hard that he had to go to Korea to salvage his career.

Given how thoroughly he did so there (2.00 ERA and MVP honors) and has continued to do so back in the majors this year, it's a danged shame that the 31-year-old didn't get recognition.

Prior to this year, arguably the most noteworthy thing David Fry had ever done in baseball was serve as the player to be named later in a trade.

That was in March 2022, when the Cleveland Guardians got him from the Milwaukee Brewers to complete a deal involving righty reliever J.C. Mejia. Fry was technically a prospect, but only one who had ranked at No. 33 in Milwaukee's system for FanGraphs.

Two years later, the 28-year-old is an All-Star.

And certainly a deserving one, at that. Fry has batted .305/.412/.508 in 66 games for the Guardians, yet his bat might not be the most valuable thing he's had to offer. In addition to designated hitter, he's started games at catcher, first base, left field and right field.

Would Brent Rooker have been a more deserving choice for the AL's reserve DH spot? There's an argument there, though one would hope that a former upstart All-Star like himself can appreciate Fry's selection.

The Milwaukee Brewers will have William Contreras and Christian Yelich in the NL's starting lineup, but are otherwise unrepresented among the team's reserves and pitchers.

Out of all their guys, nobody has a bigger gripe about this than Brice Turang.

The 24-year-old second baseman is to position players what Fedde is for pitchers, as his 3.9 wins above replacement is the highest for any non-injured player (i.e., not Mookie Betts) to be left out in the cold in relation to the Midsummer Classic.

Turang is batting .288 and is second to only Elly De La Cruz with 29 stolen bases, and what he's done with his glove is not to be ignored either. He's one of only two players with 12 Defensive Runs Saved, and the other is a catcher.

"I think he's more than deserving," Yelich said of Turang's snub. "He's an all-star caliber player and has done everything you need to do to participate in that game. He's made huge strides since last year and turned into a really good player. It's tough."

Two years ago, Paul Skenes was an Air Force cadet who had two good, yet also unspectacular seasons to show for his college pitching career.

A year later, he was the No. 1 pick in the MLB draft. And now, he's an All-Star.

This is a major league first, as Bob Nightengale of USA Today notes that no previous No. 1 picks had ever made the All-Star Game just a year after being drafted. It's nonetheless an appropriate-feeling achievement for Skenes, whose rise is the very definition of "meteoric."

Take what he did upon transferring to LSU and mash it with his work in both the minors and the majors as a pro, and his last two seasons have yielded 216 innings with a 1.83 ERA and 300 more strikeouts (342) than walks (42).

It goes to show that having a 100 mph fastball and an unhittable splinker is a pretty good recipe for pitching success. It's working for the 22-year-old Skenes, anyway, and so thoroughly that there's even a case that he should start for the National League.

Skenes is not, however, the best rookie of 2024. Nor is San Diego Padres center fielder Jackson Merrill, who likewise made the NL All-Star team.

At least according to wins above replacement, it's Masyn Winn.

The St. Louis Cardinals' 22-year-old shortstop boasts a .294 batting average that puts him just outside the top 10 among all National League hitters. It's also the best mark among all qualified rookies, a sample that notably includes Merrill at .288.

Otherwise, Winn is arguably the best defensive shortstop in MLB right now. So says Defensive Runs Saved, of which he has 10 so far.

Granted, position players who shine with hitting and defense and not so much with power and speed generally aren't considered All-Star material. But value is value is value, and Winn's is so great that it'll be a crime if he isn't added to the NL roster eventually.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.