Baseball’s highest paid player shutout
Campbell wins John Deere. Rizzo, Martinez fired. Astros sweep Dodgers
Good morning, all! I hope your week, after the 4th of July, is a terrific one.
Baseball’s highest paid player is not going to the All-Star game. That’s right. Juan Soto, who was a free agent entering this season and signed a 15-year, $765M contract with the Mets, did not win the fans’ vote and was not selected to represent the National League All-Stars in the July 15 All-Star game in Atlanta.
Through 91 games, Soto has a .263 average with 21 home runs and 51 runs batted in. Solid numbers to be sure but borderline All-Star numbers. Certainly the numbers do not live up to being baseball’s highest paid player.
Soto sputtered at the season’s start then got hot in June, earning NL Player of the Month honors. That was not enough, however, to make MLB’s showcase game. Perhaps that will serve as an impetus for Soto to have a breakout second-half.
Here are some other DAN ON SPORTS top stories for Monday, July 7, 2025:
The Washington Nationals have fired GM Mike Rizzo, 64, and manager Dave Martinez, after the mediocre Red Sox swept the Nationals in a three-game, weekend series. This does not come as a surprise. I had written in a previous newsletter that Martinez, 60, was on thin ice. Now the ice has cracked. The timing is a bit suspect, because the MLB draft is next week. That said, Mike DeBartolo, assistant GM, has been named interim GM. The Nationals are expected to name a manager today. You knew something was up last week, when The Athletic ran a story, quoting Rizzo as saying the team was no longer in a rebuild. The Nationals won the World Series in 2019 and have been going down hill ever since.
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DAN