OPS is an acronym for On-base Plus Slugging. Two of the best individual statistics for measuring offensive performance are on-base percentage and slugging average. On-base percentage measures how often a player gets on base. Slugging average measures how often a hitter turns his hits into extra bases. Each of these two statistics taken by itself are a better measure of a player’s offensive ability than the most commonly known baseball statistic, batting average (hits divided by official at bats). When added together to form OPS, it becomes the single most easily-calculated offensive statistic.

Based on their OPS at the All-Star Break, the American League team should have been:

• C Ivan Rodriguez (.978 OPS)
• 1B Frank Thomas (1.036)
• 2B Juan Uribe (.858)
• 3B Melvin Mora (1.014)
• SS Carlos Guillen (.937)
• OF Manny Ramirez (1.088)
• OF Vladimir Guerrero (1.077)
• OF Gary Sheffield (.908)

The team voted by the fans actually was:

• C Rodriguez
• 1B Jason Giambi (.834, ranked 9th at 1B)
• 2B Alfonso Soriano (.788, ranked 5th)
• 3B Alex Rodriguez (.912, ranked 3rd)
• SS Derek Jeter (.786, ranked 6th)
• OF Ramirez
• OF Guerrero
• OF Hideki Matsui (.886, ranked 4th)

Fans picked the OPS leader at three positions and did fine picking New York Yankee outfielder Matsui, who ranked fourth in the outfield, behind his third place Yankee teammate, Gary Sheffield. However, the New York popularity bias became quite evident as Yankees Giambi, Jeter, Alex Rodriguez and former Yankee Soriano were picked ahead of more deserving players. There were five Yankees or former Yankees among the eight starters selected by the fans. None of them ranked better than third at their position in OPS.