Kansas City Royals Are Not Sorry Their Team Is Dominating All-Star Game Voting

If the current 2015 MLB All-Star Game voting results hold, the Midsummer Classic will essentially be the Kansas City Royals against the National League's best.

The Royals aren't apologizing for that.

As MLB.com's Austin Laymance noted last week, seven Kansas City players are in line to start this year's All-Star Game in Cincinnati. Currently, catcher Salvador Perez, center fielder Lorenzo Cain, left fielder Alex Gordon, first baseman Eric Hosmer, third baseman Mike Moustakas, shortstop Alcides Escobar and designated hitter Kendrys Morales all lead their respective positions.

And they're not that far from hogging the whole lineup. Royals second baseman Omar Infante, who is hitting just .204 this season, trails the Houston Astros' Jose Altuve by fewer than 200,000 votes for the starting spot, and right fielder Alex Rios, who is hitting .197, sits at fourth in outfield voting.

Update: In the latest vote tally, per @MLB_PR, Kansas City now has eight players in line to start at the All-Star Game. Infante has jumped Altuve. Los Angeles Angels star Mike Trout is now the only non-Royals player on pace to be in the starting lineup. Trout, currently the second-leading vote getter among American League outfielders, is nearly 2 million votes ahead of Rios.

Back in 1957, Major League Baseball stepped in when Cincinnati Reds fans stuffed the ballots and got seven players from the team into the starting lineup. Some may be hoping the organization steps in again.

However, the Royals think it should be up to the fans to do something about the votes.

"There's nothing wrong," Kansas City manager Ned Yost said, per Bob Nightengale of USA Today. "Vote! The votes are the votes. If you don't like it, go out there and vote. Our fans have gotten out and voted. Does seven starters surprise you? Yeah. But once you sit back and think about it, it's really not that surprising."

Hosmer echoed his manager's sentiments, also per Nightengale: "I don't know what people want us to do. Are we supposed to tell people to stop voting for us?"

Gordon, a two-time All-Star, isn't apologizing for his team's domination of the fan vote, but he does want to see a change in the way players are selected to the teams. Here's what he had to say on the matter, per Nightengale:

"

To be honest with you, I've never agreed with the All-Star voting. I always thought that guys most deserving, and having the best years, should go, especially now that the All-Star Game decide who wins home field advantage. But it's a popularity thing now, and after getting to the World Series, we got popular.

But we get seven guys starting at the All-Star game, they'll change the rule. They'll have to. It will be like a home game. Nobody wants to see one team playing against the other All-Star team.

It kind of ruins the point of an All-Star Game.

"

The Royals seem to acknowledge the flaw in the system, but they also understand it's not their problem. It's up to the fans to vote. If the fans don't like the current results, they can do something about it.

Voting will be open through July 2. If fans don't want to see the Royals take on the NL, they have a few weeks to change it. But if the American League lineup is filled with Kansas City players, the Royals aren't going to feel bad about it.

[USA Today]