Major League Baseball
Ichiro single Mariner voted to All-Star Game

By Larry Stone
Seattle Times staff reporter

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ST. LOUIS — The Mariners will have just one All-Star representative for the first time since 1999 — not coincidentally, their last losing season.

Ichiro made a stirring comeback in fan balloting to grab the final starting job in the American League outfield. In sixth place just two weeks ago, Ichiro will make his fourth consecutive start. With 1,891,136 votes, he edged out countryman Hideki Matsui of the Yankees by 36,018 votes to join Anaheim's Vladimir Guerrero and Boston's Manny Ramirez in the AL outfield.

"It was a lot easier to tell five (actually four) guys last year than just one guy this year," said Mariners manager Bob Melvin. "Ichiro is just a perennial all-star. There's no telling how many he's going to run off in a row starting the All-Star Game, and deservedly so."

The biggest Mariners' omission was closer Eddie Guardado, who has a 1.19 earned-run average and 15 saves in 32 appearances. Guardado had made the past two AL teams pitching for Minnesota.

"When you retire at the end of your career, it would have been nice to say that was my third one," he said. "But I'll get to spend time with my family, and that's what's more important to me, too. When you pitch OK and you don't make it, it's kind of disturbing, but life goes on. As long as Ichiro made it, that's great. I can enjoy my family."

Ichiro is hitting .318 and on pace for another 200-hit season. The past three years, he was the leading vote-getter in the major leagues, last year tallying 2,130,708 votes — more than 200,000 ahead of this year.

"I am honored to get to go to the All-Star Game," he said through his interpreter, Allen Turner. "But I would rather be going with some of my teammates."

Ichiro said he wasn't following the vote totals, which last week had him trailing Matsui by 57,019 votes.

"We haven't been playing as well this year, and fans probably haven't been following us as much as in the past," he said. "But comparing it to the last three years, I am more surprised (to be a starter)."

Asked what he likes most about the All-Star Game, Ichiro replied, "It's tough to answer that question after we lost today, and the situation of our team."
 
The situation is that the Mariners have the second-worst record in the American League, which goes a long way toward explaining why they didn't match recent All-Star selections. In 1999, Ken Griffey Jr. was their sole All-Star. The Mariners peaked in their 116-win season of 2001, when eight players plus manager Lou Piniella represented them at the game in Seattle.

"That kind of epitomizes our first half," Bret Boone said of the lone All-Star. "We've been fortunate in recent years to have a lot of representatives. To be honest with you, not too many guys were up for consideration, the way we've gone. Eddie was a possibility, but we haven't given him enough opportunities. Some of the pitchers pitched well, but record-wise, they're not going to match up with the other guys."

Boone, who made the team in 2001 and 2003, will spend July 12, the first day of the All-Star break, in Seattle with his wife, Suzi, who is scheduled to induce labor for the birth of twins.

Ichiro was asked if he would partake in the Home Run Derby.

"You can probably tell if I'm going to enter by looking at me, looking at my body," he replied. "If there was a bunt contest, I'd be entered in that."

Larry Stone: 206-464-3146 or lstone@seattletimes.com