MLB All-Star game: Internet voting a failure. [View all]

[Auggie]

Want to see a "nobody" starting shortstop with a .232 batting average? You almost did.

Baseball fans did indeed stuff the ballot boxes -- in San Francisco. The Giants launched an all-out marketing push in the past few days to get their players elected. They made constant announcements on the air and in the ballpark. They installed electronic terminals at AT&T Park so fans could cast the 25 ballots each was allowed. The result:

• San Francisco's Brandon Crawford, a .232 hitter, came within 306,000 votes of upending Rafael Furcal for starting shortstop.

• Pablo Sandoval, who missed five weeks after his hamate surgery, blew past Wright to win at third base, beating the Met 5.74 million to 4.13 million. Sandoval had trailed by 400,000 in the last update.

• First baseman Brandon Belt, who had only 171 at-bats before Sunday, received 3.9 million votes and finished second behind the Reds' Joey Votto, who got 7.3 million.

• Miguel Cabrera, who fell into fourth place in outfield voting in results announced six days ago, rocketed over Carlos Beltran, Matt Kemp and Ryan Braun to lead all outfielders with 7.52 million votes, nearly 1.1 million more than Beltran got in second place.

• Injured Freddy Sanchez got 2.29 million votes and finished fourth at second base even though he has not played in 13 months.

• Aubrey Huff, currently rehabbing in AAA, got 1.9 million votes for the outfield spot.

Epic fail, MLB. Giants' fans sent you a loud message. The system can be rigged, legally, especially when a franchise promotes ballot stuffing and installs ball-park voting terminals to help. Think this won't spur retaliation from the Yankees? Phillies? Dodgers?

Do you hear the grumbling? Internet voting -- at a maximum 25 votes per fan -- is doing the opposite of which it was intended. Instead of engaging fans it is polarizing them even more.

So do it now -- limit internet voting to one vote per fan.

Better yet -- end fan voting entirely and let current and former players and coaches set the rosters. This will make the game actually mean something.

Info for this post came from The San Francisco Chronicle Sports page on 7-2-12: http://www.sfgate.com/giants/article/Posey-Cabrera-Sandoval-Cain-are-NL-All-Stars-3677369.php