ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - This wasn't quite the same as JFK taking Illinois away from Richard Nixon in the dead of a November night in 1960 with the help of some ghost voters in Boss Daley's Chicago. But after coming from behind to win a position as the American League's starting shortstop in the 70th All-Star Game, Nomar Garciaparra of the Red Sox can now stake his own claim on winning an election that appeared all but lost.
Was Nomar Garciaparra's remarkable rally a Net gain by the wide web of Sox fans?
(Globe File Photo)
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''You guys are shocked, too,'' Garciaparra said to reporters here last night after overtaking both Derek Jeter of the Yankees and Omar Vizquel of the Indians in becoming one of nine players voted to start for the American League team next Tuesday in Fenway Park. ''It's nice, but I'm probably as shocked as you guys.''
Garciaparra, who trailed Jeter by 30,655 votes in balloting a week ago and had also fallen behind Vizquel, won by 20,446 votes over Jeter, with Vizquel trailing by more than 51,000 votes. He becomes the first Red Sox shortstop to be voted an AL All-Star starter since 1977, when Rick Burleson nosed out Bucky Dent of the Yankees by just over 7,000 votes, and the first Sox player to be elected a starter since Wade Boggs in 1992.
Mo Vaughn started at first base in the 1996 game for the AL, but Vaughn replaced the elected starter, Frank Thomas of the Chicago White Sox, because of an injury.
''Somebody must have stuffed the ballot box for Nomar,'' said Vaughn with a half-smile before last night's Angels-Mariners game in Anaheim, Calif. ''He was way behind last time I looked. You never know how those things turn out.''
Patrick Courtney, public relations manager for Major League Baseball, said last night that while the polls closed June 26, a large number of votes were not counted until last week. Besides balloting at the ballpark, fans had the opportunity to vote on the Internet, at WalMart, and through Pepsi-Cola outlets.
''The honest truth is, there's no rhyme or reason when the votes come in,'' Courtney said. ''Some teams will send their votes in five or six different shipments, while others send more at the end. They come in sporadically, so they don't follow a pattern.
''I'm sure the homestand the Red Sox had at the end helped a lot, because by then it was a big story. I think [the outcome] was a little surprising because Jeter had been leading the whole time, but they were so close, we realized anything could happen.''
A story by the Associated Press credited the Red Sox' ''high-tech campaigning'' for shifting the election to Garciaparra, but the Red Sox only issued one release on their website (redsox.com), back on June 8, informing fans they could vote on the Internet.
Garciaparra laughed at the idea that Boston's huge and Internet-savvy college-age population wore their computers out voting for him. ''Yeah, I guess a lot of people got on the Internet and stuff,'' he said.
Four members of the Cleveland Indians, who lead the majors in attendance, made the starting lineup. Jim Thome (1,364,692) will be at first base, and Roberto Alomar (2,793,891) starts at second. Teammates Kenny Lofton (1,676,595) and Manny Ramirez (1,898,430) join leading vote-getter Ken Griffey Jr. of Seattle in the outfield.
Griffey became the leading All-Star vote-getter for the fourth straight year and seventh time overall. Griffey, elected to start for the 10th consecutive time, got 2,918,055 votes.
The rest of the AL starting lineup: Texas' Ivan Rodriguez (1,897,774) at catcher, Baltimore's Cal Ripken (1,285,728) at third base, and Tampa Bay's Jose Canseco (1,664,282) at designated hitter.
Garciaparra, who missed his third straight game last night with a strained left groin, was told of his selection during batting practice by Red Sox publicist Glenn Wilburn. The first clue that the election had swung his way came when he stood behind the protective screen at second base and shook hands with close friend Lou Merloni.
With Fenway Park serving as host for the All-Star Game for only the third time, Garciaparra is expected to share the role of hometown favorite with pitcher Pedro Martinez, who will be named to the 30-man AL squad tomorrow when the reserves and pitchers, as selected by manager Joe Torre of the Yankees, are announced. A 15-game winner, Martinez is a lock to be selected as the starting pitcher by Torre, who openly had campaigned for his shortstop, Jeter, in recent weeks.
Jeter is second in the American League in batting with a .372 average, 6 percentage points ahead of Garciaparra, who is third at .366. The Yankees shortstop is also second in the league in hits (115) and leads in triples (7) while ranking third in runs (71) and total bases (192).
''Derek, look at what he's doing, it's unbelievable,'' Garciaparra said. ''Ask me, I believe he deserves it.''
There was not much concern in New York last night. Callers to New York's all-sports radio station WFAN were more concerned about the current status of the Yankees than Jeter's non-selection by the fans.
After an hour and a half of calls, only one person, who said that Jeter was robbed, talked about the situation. Host Richard Neer responded by comparing the two players' offensive stats and went on to say that New York fans don't take voting for the All-Star game as seriously as other cities.
Garciaparra hit .394 in June, and before reaggravating his groin injury last Friday night in Chicago, he had extended to 17 games his season-best hitting streak, one in which he is batting .531 (34 for 64) with four home runs, 10 doubles, and a triple. He has driven in 14 runs during his streak while scoring nine. He's also hitting .360 with runners in scoring position.
''It's nice it's here at home,'' he said, ''but I'm concerned right now about getting healthy.''
Jeter, who met with reporters in New York prior to the Yankees' game with the Orioles, indicated he had no quarrel with the outcome.
''It's a situation where there are so many great shortstops in the league, you can pick any one,'' Jeter said. ''If I was voting, I would have voted for Nomar.''
Seattle shortstop Alex Rodriguez, who had started at short for the AL stars in each of the last two seasons, missed the first month of the season because of an injury and finished fourth in the voting, more than 450,000 votes behind Garciaparra.
Last season, Indians manager Mike Hargrove added Jeter and Vizquel as reserves while leaving Garciaparra off the team. Hargrove was booed loudly in Boston when the Indians came to town a week later, while Garciaparra finished runner-up in the voting for the league's Most Valuable Player Award.
Jeter, asked how he'd pick among Garciaparra, Rodriguez, and himself, said: ''Flip a coin, if you can find a three-sided coin.''
Sure, Jeter said, he would like to have been named starter, but he noted even that might have had its pitfalls.
''Everyone wants to start,'' he said, ''but that's a Catch-22. [The game] is in Boston. I don't know what the fans would say.''
It has been 38 years since the All-Star Game was played in Boston. Pitcher Don Schwall was the only Sox player to appear in that game, and he gave up the National League's only run in a 1-1 tie that was called after nine innings because of rain.
Five Sox players were on the 1941 AL team - Joe Cronin, Dom DiMaggio, Bobby Doerr, Jimmie Foxx, and Ted Williams. Williams won that game with a ninth-inning home run that is widely considered the most dramatic moment in All-Star history. Garciaparra almost certainly won't have a chance to match that feat; with so many shortstops at Torre's disposal, his night probably will be long over by the late innings.
But Garciaparra's selection eventually could be worth $1 million to him. A clause in his contract stipulates that if he is an All-Star four times in a five-year period that began last year when he signed his multi-year deal with the club, he will be paid an additional $500,000 in each of the two option years of his contract.
Larry Whiteside of the Globe Staff and correspondent Andy Nesbitt contributed to this report; material from the Associated Press also was used.
