10 possible first-time All-Stars 

June, 9, 2012
6/09/12
11:13
AM ET
By Jim Bowden | ESPN.com

This year's All-Star Game could showcase some interesting first-time All-Stars. I offered my early All-Star picks in the National League and American Leagueand pulled from there 10 intriguing players who could be first-time All-Stars. Some are phenoms, others are finally fulfilling the expectations heaped on them years ago. Others still just needed a chance or found a way to reinvent themselves. Regardless, these 10 guys have made their cases be in Kansas City on July 10.


American League

Edwin Encarnacion, DH, Toronto Blue Jays
Eleven years ago I traded Rob Bell to the Texas Rangers for Encarnacion and Ruben Mateo. I made the deal with then-Rangers general manager Doug Melvin. Trade negotiations dragged on for two months because of his reluctance to give up the 18-year-old Encarnacion. A decade later, Blue Jays fans are seeing why Melvin and I wanted him. Encarnacion, a below average defender at third base, has done a good job adapting to the DH role and been adequate at first base when manager John Farrell puts him there. It may have taken a decade for him to live up to his potential, but he’s finally having his breakout season.


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Jim Bowden
Jim Bowden

Bowden, who served as the senior vice president and GM for the Cincinnati Reds and the Washington Nationals, is an analyst for ESPN.com. In 1992, Bowden became the youngest GM in MLB history when the Reds hired him at age 31. The Reds finished in first place twice during his 10 years as GM, and he was named MLB Executive of the Year by Baseball America in 1999. After working for ESPN in 2004, Bowden became the first GM of the Washington Nationals when the franchise relocated from Montreal to Washington, D.C., in 2005, working in that role until the 2009 season. Bowden co-hosts the "Inside Pitch" radio show on Sirius XM satellite radio. Follow on Twitter: @JimBowdenESPNxm.

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