Twins pitcher Jake Odorizzi joins Jorge Polanco on American League All-Star team

CHICAGO – Jake Odorizzi made a speech in front of his teammates Sunday. He didn't expect it to be a monologue.

Odorizzi received the news during a pregame clubhouse meeting that he — and only he — has been added to the AL All-Star team. Odorizzi, who will be joined by fan-elected starter Jorge Polanco, got up and thanked the other Twins for helping him achieve the honor.

But he couldn't shake the disappointment that there aren't more Twins invited to Cleveland for the festivities.

"There's a whole lot of deserving guys in our locker room that should be coming along, too," Odorizzi said. "It's been pretty well-publicized this year how well our offense has done, and to only have one guy out of that record-breaking offense makes it [is a mistake]."

It's more than that, said Byron Buxton. It's the baseball world underestimating the Twins.

"Should we be [shocked]?" Buxton said of the snub. "I mean, everybody ruled us out at the beginning of the season. So [we'll] just keep doing what we're doing. Even though we know people in here got shortchanged, it doesn't change what we're trying to do or what we're trying to approach."

If Buxton wasn't shocked, manager Rocco Baldelli said he was.

"I truly, deep down know we have more than two guys that deserve to be All-Stars," Baldelli said. "If it's done by performance and what guys did for a team that played really well in the first half and put up the numbers — if it was based on that, we would have more than two."

He wouldn't single anyone out, but Max Kepler, for instance, ranks fifth in the AL in home runs, eighth in RBI and 10th in wins above replacement (WAR). Eddie Rosario is seventh in homers and second in RBI. C.J. Cron has one fewer RBI than Kepler, and Nelson Cruz has driven in more runs and owns a higher OPS than any other designated hitter. Buxton, despite missing two weeks because of a wrist injury, ranks third on the team in WAR.

"It's shocking," Cruz said. "Disappointing, because definitely we have the best offensive team in the league."

In addition, Jose Berrios and Taylor Rogers have strong cases to join the pitching staff.

"You look at every part of our team and find guys you could make not just good arguments — they should be All-Stars. Guys that are obvious All-Stars that weren't selected," Baldelli said. "You look in the outfield, clearly, [but also the] infield, our DH, in our rotation and in our bullpen, and you can find an All-Star at every one of those spots. And we ended up with two."

The reserves and pitching staffs are chosen based on a vote of the players, plus invitations handed out by the commissioner's office in order to include a player from every team. But the Twins believe a first-place team with 53 wins should have more than two All-Stars — especially, for example, when the 38-win White Sox are sending three. Only Houston, with six, has more selections in the AL.

Polanco and Odorizzi give the Twins multiple All-Stars for the fifth time in the past seven years, but the team had hoped to challenge the franchise record of six, set in 1965, or at least match the five All-Stars from 1964, 1971 and 1988.

Odorizzi had planned to spend the break in Minneapolis with his wife and two young children, but instead will take the whole family, including parents and in-laws, to Cleveland. They might not get to see him pitch, however.

Odorizzi is scheduled to start Tuesday at Oakland and again Sunday vs. Texas — which would prevent him from pitching in the All-Star Game two days later. All-Stars unable to pitch in the actual game normally take part in the festivities, but are replaced on the roster — a situation that could open the door for Berrios or Rogers.

Odorizzi remains hopeful he and Polanco will not be alone in Cleveland. "The fact that Kepler isn't an All-Star, with his top three or four [status] in the league in just about every category besides average, and what he's meant to this team, that's the one that's a real head-scratcher to me," he said. "But hopefully between now and then, there are always people who get added."

Odorizzi is certainly deserving, too. The 29-year-old has been the most consistently effective pitcher on the staff. The Twins won 11 of his starts in a row, with Odorizzi giving up 11 runs in 65 innings — a 1.52 ERA — in a two-month span.

Being an All-Star "wasn't a driving factor for me. I just wanted to keep doing the best I could for everybody in there," said Odorizzi, who is 10-3 with a 2.73 ERA and 94 strikeouts in 85⅔ innings. "That's the mind-set everybody our team has — playing for each other, as opposed to playing for yourself."