Mullins headed to first All-Star Game
Daniel Guerrero
@TheDanGuerreroANAHEIM -- Following a breakout first half of the season, Cedric Mullins has earned All-Star honors for the first time in his MLB career.
The 26-year-old was announced as a reserve for this year’s All-Star Game at Coors Field during Sunday’s All-Star Selection Show on ESPN and will be Baltimore’s lone representative.
“It’s a great feeling,” Mullins said on receiving the honor. “I’m excited to be amongst some of the top guys in baseball and I'm just looking forward to see what happens.”
Despite being selected as a reserve, Mullins has put together as strong of a case as the rest of the AL outfielders selected to the game.
Mullins has batted .313 with a .916 OPS through his first 82 games with Baltimore. His .916 OPS led all AL outfielders coming into Sunday, while his .313 average was second. He also entered Sunday tied with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. for the AL lead in hits with 99. He’s just one of three players in MLB with at least 15-plus stolen bases and 35-plus extra-base hits, with the other two being Ronald Acuña Jr. of the Braves and Fernando Tatis Jr. of the Padres.
Mullins struggled in the 2019 season, batting .094 in 22 games. However, he showed major improvements in 2020, hitting .271 in 48 games during the shortened season. Mullins believes being selected to the All-Star Game shows how much he’s grinded to succeed.
“I knew that I was gonna have some bounce back,” Mullins said. “[2019] was just a really tough year for me. I know that I've had success in the past. I think it was a testament to all the work that I've put in and just kind of narrowing in on what I needed to improve on to be more consistent in the big leagues.”
Mullins finished sixth among the top nine AL outfielders during Phase 2 of the ASG vote, finishing behind Mike Trout, Aaron Judge, Teoscar Hernández, Byron Buxton and Michael Brantley. With Trout, Judge and Hernández earning the fan vote to start, there’s a chance Mullins could get the nod to replace Trout, who isn’t expected back from his right calf strain until after the All-Star break.
Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said telling Mullins he was named to the All-Star team in front of the entire clubhouse was “a special moment.”
“It felt really good to let him know in front of everybody that he was an All-Star, and I'm hoping that he starts,” Hyde said.
Regardless of whether he starts or not, Mullins is hoping to showcase his skills on the global stage. He said he wants to show who he’s always been and display that he is “someone that goes out there and plays hard.”
“It’d be awesome,” Mullins said on the possibility of starting. “To make the team, it’s a great honor in itself, but to be able to start, that’d be something that’s almost unexplainable.”