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Major League Baseball announced today that Astros second baseman Jose Altuve has been elected to start for the American League All-Star team at second base.
#YesWayJose! @JoseAltuve27 is the starting 2B for the AL All-Star Team. Congrats, Jose! #ASG #HTownPride #Astros pic.twitter.com/5sWAM6cCe7
— Houston Astros (@astros) July 5, 2015
It if the first time that Altuve was selected to start in All-Star game by the fans, and his third overall selection as an All-Star (2012 & 2014).
Houston and fans across the Major Leagues voted pust Altuve over the top in the final week after he had been trailing Royal's second baseman Omar Infante for the past three week. Altuve had 7,282,934 votes on June 29, and trailed Infante by 231,708 heading into the final week of voting. Altuve received 2,351,530 additional votes during the final week, finishing with a total of 9,634,464 votes, surpassing Infante (8,999,117) by 635,347 total votes.
Altuve said of the fan vote:
"I really appreciate everything that the fans did for me, and the whole organization putting all the things together to win the fan vote," said Altuve.
Altuve becomes the seventh player (10th time overall) in Astros history to earn a fan-elected start, and the first to do so since Houston moved to the AL for the 2013 season. He joins 2015 Hall of Fame electee Craig Biggio (1995-98) and Jeff Kent (2004) as Houston second basemen to earn a fan election and is the first Astros player elected to start by fans since first baseman Lance Berkman in 2008. The other Astros fan-elected starters: first basemen Lee May (1972) and Jeff Bagwell (1997); outfielder Cesar Cedeno (1973).
Altuve is currently batting .302 this season with an AL-leading 23 stolen bases.
The 86th MLB All-Star Game will be played on Tuesday, July 14th at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati.