Soroka named National League All-Star

Photo: Baseball Canada

June 20, 2019

By Adam Morissette

Baseball Canada

OTTAWA- Calgary’s Mike Soroka is headed to Cleveland and the 2019 Major League Baseball All-Star Game as rosters were revealed earlier today.

Soroka, 21, is enjoying a spectacular rookie campaign with the Atlanta Braves where he’s tied for second in the National League in wins (nine) and earned runs average (2.13) while holding hitters to a measly .206 batting average over 84 2/3 innings pitched.

Since making his season debut with the Braves on April 18, the Junior National Team alumnus has been one of the top starters in the National League as part of a Braves club that sits atop the National League East standings with a 50-34 record.

Soroka becomes the 20th Canadian to be named to a MLB All-Star team and first Canadian rookie since Jeff Zimmerman (Kelowna, BC), who was an all-star in 1999. The all-star nod also represents the first time an Alberta-born athlete has been named to MLB’s “midsummer classic”.

As an amateur, Soroka starred on Baseball Canada’s Junior National Team for two years (2014, 2015) and helped Canada to a bronze medal finish at the 2014 COPABE 18U Pan Am Championships before the Braves made him a first round draft pick (28th overall) in the 2015 MLB First-Year Player Draft.