Twins’ Polanco proves All-Star worthiness, readies for 2nd half run

By Tony Langfellow

 Cleveland, Ohio – Cleveland held the 90th MLB All-Star Game at the home of the Indians, Progressive Field on July 9, bringing the best baseball players in the world together for a weekend of fun events. It was the sixth time in club history that Cleveland has hosted this yearly exhibition game, and no other city in baseball has had the All-Star Game more than the city of Cleveland.

Just behind the Cleveland Indians is Minnesota (as the Twins and Washington Senators), the San Francisco Giants, the Pittsburgh Pirates, and the Cincinnati Reds all hosting five All-Star Games in their team history.

At this year’s gathering of the Mid-Summer Classic, one of the starters was Minnesota Twins shortstop, Jorge Polanco. Polanco was voted in as a starter by fans as the number one shortstop in the American league beating out Carlos Correa of the Astros, Gleybert Torres of the Yankees, Francisco Lindor from the Indians, and the Red Sox’s Xander Bogaerts.

“It says a lot [about the fans] because they gave me a lot of confidence, they support me,” Polanco said. “They supported me a lot and they voted for me. I’m just very thankful they did that and very thankful they supported me on the voting.”

In Polanco’s first appearance at the plate, he struggled against the Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw and ended up waving at strike three, leaving a runner stranded on the bases in the second inning. 

At the time, the score was 1-0 in favor of the American League.  But in the fifth inning, Polanco got an RBI single off of Dodger Walker Buehler giving the A.L.  a 2-0 lead, and it was an RBI that proved his validity as a representative of the Twins in the All-Star Game. 

“A lot of emotions were going on when I was going to the plate, [and] I was facing Buehler… that’s a good pitcher, it was a lot of emotions and I felt happy I could do the job and get a base hit,” Polanco said.

Jorge Polanco    photo by Bryan Singer

Polanco wasn’t the only representative in the All-Star Game from Minnesota as he was joined by teammates Jose Berrios and Jake Odorizzi. Berrios was selected to play in place of Odorizzi who was on the injured list, but Berrios validated his spot on the roster by pitching for the AL in the 3rd inning, putting away the side and not allowing any runs, striking out two batters and only gave up one hit.

Berrios and Polanco showed in part why the Twins are the first place team in the AL Central with their representation in the All-Star Game, but Polanco was mostly just happy to finally be named an All-Star.

“I was very happy that I made the All Star team, and I knew I was going to enjoy this, and I did, I enjoyed it the most I could,” he said.

Although the two Twins helped lead the AL to the 4-3 victory over the National League in the game, when all of the Twins players were announced by the public address announcer at Progressive Field for the pre-game announcements, the stadium erupted with booing from the rival Cleveland Indians fans, but it didn’t even seem to phase Polanco.

“I wasn’t expecting that, I didn’t even know why they did that. If they booed me or if they applaud me, I wasn’t paying attention to any of that,” Polanco said.

The booing that Berrios, Odorizzi and Polanco received couldn’t even be compared to how loud fans booed all of the New York Yankees and Chicago Cubs players, but it is all supposed to be seen in good fun.

“You know why [they booed]? Because the fans have a lot of respect and when you do something right, people boo you. The other team is going to boo you,” Cleveland Indians shortstop Francisco Lindor said. “For example, Chapman was the one that got booed the loudest, and he beat us [in 2016], he did something right. He deserves to get booed one time… and now people are going to love him because he helped us win today.”