Wong Falls Short of All-Star Starting Bid

Hilo native Kolten Wong will need some extra help if he wants to make the National League roster for this year’s Major League Baseball All-Star Game.

Wong, second baseman for the St. Louis Cardinals,  did not receive enough fan votes to earn a starting spot in next Tuesday’s game, held at Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati, Ohio. He finished nearly two million votes shy of Miami’s Dee Gordon, the MLB leader in hits with 116, as of games completed Sunday. Gordon finished with 7,574,750 fan votes, and Wong followed in second with 5,600,556.

Behind Gordon and Wong in the top five were Cincinnati’s Brandon Crawford, San Francisco’s Joe Panik, and Washington’s Yunel Escobar.

On Monday, MLB will announce the starting pitchers and reserves for each squad. The players will have an opportunity to vote in eight NL reserves, nine AL reserves, and eight pitchers on each side. After that, each manager will round out its 34-man roster, with the exception of one spot left for the fan’s Final Vote. NL manager Bruce Bochy of San Francisco will get to choose nine players. Four of them will be position players.

The MLB All-Star Game will be televised on local FOX affiliate KHON2 at 2 p.m. Hawai’i time. It will also be broadcast on radio on ESPN Radio affiliates AM 850 in Hilo and AM 790 in Kona.