The hierarchy of stars was obvious even in the table arrangements.
At an All-Star Game media day event on Monday at the Roxy Coca-Cola Theater in Atlanta, the Dodgers’ five All-Star representatives were in the same area of the large venue.
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In the first row, basking under large spotlights near an elevated stage, Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman and Clayton Kershaw were positioned front and center, expected to attract so many reporters that retractable ropes lined the perimeter of their podiums.
Several feet behind them, in the shadows of a balcony overhang, sat Will Smith and Yoshinobu Yamamoto.
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An obvious A-List, followed by a clear B-group.
And even then, where Yamamoto’s media contingent stretched several rows deep, Smith’s rarely swelled beyond a few people.
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He was a third-time All-Star, National League starter and batting title contender — once again relegated to the background of the sport’s public consciousness.
“He’s up there as far as being overlooked,” Dodgers manager and NL All-Star skipper Dave Roberts said of his ever-present but easily forgotten backstop. “You know what you’re going to get, but you probably don’t appreciate it as much as you should.”
Appreciated, Smith has not been this year. Not fully, at the very least.
Entering the All-Star break, the 30-year-old slugger is a distant leader in the NL batting race, sporting a .323 mark that outpaces the next closest qualified hitter (his recently slumping teammate, Freeman) by a whopping 26 points.
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Smith also has 12 home runs, 46 RBIs, and a .965 OPS (which trails only his two-way teammate, Ohtani) in addition to a 15% walk rate (fifth-best in the league).
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According to Fangraphs’ all-encompassing wRC+ metric, only Yankees superstar Aaron Judge and Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh have been more productive hitters this season.
And he’s done it all while shepherding a banged-up Dodgers pitching staff, helping keep the team atop the NL West despite it having used 35 different arms through the first half of the year.
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“For him to go out there, catching these guys, having your team in first place, and then you’re hitting .325, I don’t think people are paying attention to that,” Freeman said Monday, peering through a forest of reporters to catch a glimpse of Smith over his shoulder. “People are gonna tune into the All-Star Game, they’ll throw his numbers up on the TV, and they’re gonna be like, ‘Whoa, that’s a really good season.’”
But for as well as Smith has played, the seven-year veteran remains somewhat obscured from the public spotlight.
He is, as Roberts jokingly puts it, the most “vanilla” of the team’s collection of spotlight talent. He doesn’t have jaw-dropping highlights like Ohtani. He doesn’t have a signature World Series moment such as Freeman. He isn’t excelling at a new position such as Mookie Betts. And even when he is swarmed by reporters around the ballpark, it’s usually to field questions about catching the Dodgers’ star Japanese trio of Ohtani, Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki.
“Honestly, I don’t really care,” he said Monday. “That stuff has never been important to me. Being ‘the guy’ or not, any of that. I show up, play baseball every day, try to help the team win, try to be a good teammate, try to lead the pitchers, and ultimately try to win a World Series every year. That’s what’s important to me.”
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This year, Smith was voted an All-Star starter for the first time by fans. But, he isn’t even the most talked about catcher at this week’s festivities in Atlanta, overshadowed again by Raleigh and his 38 first-half home runs — making the slugger affectionately known as “Big Dumper,” who also won the Home Run Derby on Monday night, the best current catcher in baseball in the eyes of many around the sport.
“Will’s just always kind of really under the radar, for whatever reason,” Kershaw said. “He’s been unbelievable for us, at a position that’s really important and very demanding.”
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For Smith, the true joy of this year has simply been his health.
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Two years ago, he slumped mightily in the second half of 2023 (finishing the year with a .797 OPS) while battling a broken rib he had suffered that April. This spring, Roberts revealed that Smith’s underwhelming performance in 2024 (when he posted more career lows with a .248 average and .760 OPS) was hampered by an ankle injury that again plagued his second-half performance.
“The last couple years, I had some, not major things, but some tough injuries,” Smith said. “But that’s my decision to play through them.”
Now, however, he is back at full physical capacity, allowing him to work counts (he has almost as many walks, 45, as strikeouts, 55), punish fastballs (a pitch he struggled against the last two years) and maintain the most consistent production of any hitter in the Dodgers’ juggernaut lineup.
“I just feel like I have a really good understanding of my swing right now,” Smith said. “It’s a long season, it comes and goes. But for whatever reason this year, I’ve been able to keep it more than I haven’t. So that’s been fun. Credit to the hitting coaches as well for keeping me in that spot. I just have a really good understanding of what I’m doing up there.”
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In his typically modest fashion, Smith sidestepped a question about his chances of winning the batting title, something no catcher has done since Buster Posey in 2012.
“I’ve never been one to chase awards or anything,” he said. “I think when you do that, it probably doesn’t go your way, you put too much pressure [on yourself]. So just trying to have one good at-bat at a time, help the team win that day.”
At his current pace, he could be a recipient for MVP votes for the first time in his career as well, although the Dodgers’ careful management of his playing time has left him ranked ninth in the NL in wins above replacement to this point, according to Fangraphs.
“What he’s doing is Buster Posey-ish, Joe Mauer-ish,” Freeman said, citing the only other backstop this century with a batting title (Mauer won three with Minnesota in the late 2000s). “When you’re leading the league in hitting and you’re catching, it’s really hard to do. You’re calling games. It’s almost like they’re more worried about putting up a zero than they are about hitting.”
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In time, Freeman believes, Smith’s Q-rating will continue to rise, especially if he keeps replicating the kind of numbers he has posted this season.
“I think it just takes maybe a couple times [being here at the All-Star Game],” Freeman said. “We all know in L.A. how special he is. Obviously, the front office extended him 10 years. So, hopefully now that he’s starting in the All-Star Game, he’s gonna get that national recognition.”
But even if he doesn’t, he hardly seems to be bothered by his second-tier (and, on Monday, second-row) status.
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“I just think he’s resolved to not having to be at the forefront,” Roberts said. “He doesn’t ever self-promote. He doesn’t need notoriety or attention. He just wants to win. Some players thrive on getting attention. He’s certainly not one of those guys.”
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
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