Miguel Sano leads Twins on the 2017 All-Star Game ballot

We’re a month into the season, and you know what that means: it’s totally time to start voting for MLB All-Stars!

I know it always seems like All-Star Game balloting begins way too early, but having played 23 games, the Twins’ season is actually more than 1/7th over. Plus, MLB wants to rack up as many votes as possible, and giving non-Royals fans more time to vote helps with that (Royals fans will vote millions of times regardless of the time frame). To that end, MLB has also raised the total number of ballots each person account can cast from 25 to 35. You can cast up to five ballots a day.

So which Twins are on the ballot? The guys from the Opening Day lineup, which if you don’t remember, was this beaut:

1. Brian Dozier - 2B
2. Robbie Grossman - DH
3. Byron Buxton - CF
4. Joe Mauer - 1B
5. Miguel Sano - 3B
6. Jason Castro - C
7. Jorge Polanco - SS
8. Max Kepler - RF
9. Eddie Rosario - LF

All you Eduardo Escobar fans are still free to write-in his name on the ballot too.

We all know the fan vote is sort of stupid. For the most part it’s just a popularity contest won by the star players from teams with the biggest fan bases (i.e., Derek Jeter). Big, sexy names get votes regardless of how well they are actually doing that year (i.e., Derek Jeter). Hence, the Twins don’t usually get players voted into the starting lineup, and especially not lately. The last Twin who was voted in was Joe Mauer in 2013 because back then he was still a catcher who could hit.

But this year could be different. This year I think the Twins have a real chance of cracking the American League starting lineup with Miguel Sano.

In case you haven’t noticed (and shame on you for that), Sano has been on fire. He’s hitting .316/.443/.684 with seven home runs, actually looking pretty solid defensively at third, and currently has the eighth-highest fWAR in all of MLB. Hitting well won’t get you voted in by itself, of course—this is a popularity contest. However, I think the hype long-surrounding Sano as a prospect and overall large human could help him get the needed additional votes and consideration from non-Twins fans.

Plus, the All-Star Game is being held in Miami this year. You know, where they have The Dinger Machine. WHO WOULDN’T WANT TO SEE MIGUEL SANO MAKE THAT THING GO CRAZY IN THE HOME RUN DERBY!?

As for others, I’d say Brian Dozier would have a nice chance of getting voted in too if he was still as hot as he was last year—but obviously, he’s not. He’s hitting .242/.317/.636 with only two home runs so far.

And Byron Buxton... well, yeah.