Ten years ago Albemarle High School was in the middle of a tense election to award that years Homecoming King. In the runoff were five seniors, one of which was myself and another my good friend Shareef. His chances of winning were non-existent--yet instead of withdrawing and allowing myself to pick up his votes--he stayed in. Shareef pulled a Ross Perot and dropped me from the top relagating me to the standard Homecoming Court. If this sounds familiar it should. It happened to Derek Jeter on Wednesday when somehow he failed to land a spot on the All Star Team. Scott Podsednik--behind a juggernaut marketing campaign--was voted in by fans with Jeter a close second. Tori Hunter, Hideki Matsui and a Devil Ray that never had a shot were also in the running for the final position. Apparently baseball fans weren't voting on statistics--as Jeter dwarfs all of Podsednik's. Perhaps Jeter is a product of his own success. He needs a scandal; like flipping out on a reporter ala Kenny Rogers, or getting busted using a banned substance, even an old fashioned paternity suit would get him the attention he needed these past few days of voting. Instead Jeter just keeps plugging along putting together another Hall of Fame Season doing everything he's asked. I'm sure he'll say Podsednik deserves it and he's had his fun as an All Star. He'll be asked if he felt Matsui took away his votes and Jeter will laugh that off. Note: I do feel Shareef took my votes and I also feel he owes me an apology. Jeter is the face of Baseball. He's even in the All Star Game commercials. He's a winner on and off the field and that should be rewarded. He'll never sound off about this snub and will probably start a charity during the three days he's off. The bad news for the AL East is he'll use this as motivation to put up a great second half and push the Yanks to the playoffs. Regardless both Jeter and I should never have come down to a vote. But unlike me Jeter will always have next year and all I had was one less picture in the Yearbook. ---Craig Settimo is a contributing writer for realgm.com. He can be reached at [email protected]