Sports

Puig’s instant fame, success warrant spot in All-Star Game at Citi Field

Of course, Yasiel Puig should be an All-Star.

Because if you are going to sell your soul for TV ratings — which is what MLB did when it tied home-field advantage to the outcome of the Mid-Summer Classic — then pretty much, short of having naked women juggle flaming axes at second base, go for the ratings.

I am sorry if this offends peoples’ sense of tradition (allowing someone with fewer than 100 plate appearances to be an All-Star) or their sense of right and wrong (since someone who has earned this distinction with a strong first half will be snubbed). But if you are hunting for ratings, then face it, Puig is a star who could attract eyeballs in a way that, say, Gerardo Parra or Jay Bruce will not.

In just his first 20 games, Puig delivered 34 hits, seven homers, a couple of highlight-reel defensive plays and one helluva backstory — from mystery to mastery. Puig pops off the screen when he plays. He is a quick phenom like Mark Fidrych or Fernando Valenzuela or Jeremy Lin. At a time when MLB is trying to be hipper, trying to entice a younger demographic, Puig is a human video game.

MLB should be seizing on this insta-fame, not running away from it. The All-Star Game, after all, is an exhibition that is a promotional tool for the sport. Puig not only should be at Citi Field representing the NL, he should be in the Home Run Derby the day before. Again, do you want to sell the product?

Please don’t hit me up with making a mockery of the game. That already is achieved with many “Stars” using trumped-up injuries to back out. Or by managers emphasizing getting every player into the game over strategy to win a contest that is going to determine home-field advantage for the World Series.

Twelve months ago, two-thirds of the NL starting outfield were the Biogenesis darlings Ryan Braun and Melky Cabrera, who actually won the game’s MVP award. Would it really be more undignified to have an All-Star who spent most of the first half as a Chattanooga Lookout?

I recently asked NL Home Run Derby captain David Wright if he would consider naming Puig and Evan Gattis (this was before Gattis was lost to the DL) to his four-man squad because it would be good for selling the sport. Heck, Gattis’ story of drug use, homelessness and spiritual awakening is better than Puig’s. Wright said he still wasn’t sure how much jurisdiction he had in this area.

But look at it this way, Ryan Howard did not make the All-Star team in 2007, but was the defending Derby champion, so a loophole was created for him. In 2005, the Derby had an international theme, so Hee Seop-Choi represented South Korea without being an All-Star.

So, really, you will bend rules for Hee Seop-Choi, but not Yasiel Puig? That is just silly.

We already are up to 34 men per side. So get to 35. Make that extra spot a commissioner’s choice so that he may be able to tab, say, a great retiring player who otherwise would not make it or someone who has captivated the sports world. Ultimately, the commissioner’s most important role is to act in the best interest of baseball.

Well, how is it not in the best interest of the sport to have Yasiel Puig — insta-star — at Citi Field on July 16 for the 84th All-Star Game?

Top 5 win-now players

OVER the weekend in his ESPN blog, Buster Olney recounted a comment made by Dan Shulman in which the superb play-by-play man asked: If you just had to win a championship this season and could take any player, would you pick Yadier Molina?

It was a sign of how far Molina’s offensive game has come to mix with his defensive genius that he could be considered in the discussion. St. Louis lost Albert Pujols, Tony La Russa and highly regarded pitching coach Dave Duncan after the 2011 title yet has remained an elite team, and Molina’s excellence on both sides of the ball has been central to that.

It got me to thinking who I would pick first to try to win in 2013. My top 5:

Clayton Kershaw, Mike Trout, Miguel Cabrera, Molina and Buster Posey.

But here is the thing:

I thought long and hard about making Matt Harvey my fifth choice and the only hesitation was in not having evidence yet how he will handle a full major league season workload, though my gut says that will not be an issue. Mainly, it shows how far and quickly Harvey has come. Right now, he is the most overpowering starter in the majors.

Yanks dodge red-hot Blue Jays

THE BLUE Jays are due to get Jose Reyes back tonight. He had been out since severely spraining his ankle on April 12.

His return coincides with Toronto’s surge from underachievement to contention, notably on the strength of a recent 11-game winning streak. Reyes will go atop the only AL lineup with five players already with double-digit homers — Edwin Encarnacion, Jose Bautista, Colby Rasmus, J.P. Arencibia and Adam Lind.

In many ways, this lineup has similarity to recent Yankees orders, with a heavy reliance on multiple players who could hit the ball out. An AL executive, in fact, pointed out that it was in the warmer months of June/July/August when the Yankees traditionally began really walloping the ball and taking off in the division and that he expects Toronto is a real AL East contender for the same reason.

“Toronto is a very offensive club in what has become a very non-offensive league now,” the executive said. “Now the weather is warming up to act as a catalyst for run scoring. The Blue Jays are going to score in bunches the next few months and win games in bunches because of that.”

Which means the best friend of the Yankees might have been the schedule maker. The Yankees played nine games against Toronto by May 18. The Blue Jays had Reyes for none of them and clearly did not have their act together as they tried to deal with higher expectations than normal. The Yankees were 8-1 in those games.

The Yankees don’t see Toronto again until Aug. 20.