Ian Desmond is 2-for-2 with a home run today, but the league has announced that he’ll sit out the All-Star Game and be replaced by Braves center fielder Michael Bourn.
Desmond, who leads all shortstops with 16 home runs this season, has been nursing a strained left oblique for three weeks and decided the rest would do him some good. Since he doesn’t quite have the same profile as Derek Jeter, he can get away with it without catching too much flak.
With Desmond gone, there was another chance to get Bryce Harper on to the NL All-Star team. It would have been replacing a National with another National. However, the league went with Bourn instead. He has been the better player; he’s arguably the NL’s best defensive center fielder and he’s hitting .305/.360/.448 with 23 steals this season.
Another option would have been Jed Lowrie, a shortstop who has been essentially Desmond’s equal with the bat this season. The NL, though, still has two shortstops on the roster with Desmond out and it won’t hurt to have another true center fielder with Matt Kemp absent.
