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Ian Kinsler Falls Behind In All-Star Vote; Rangers Urge Yet More Voting

UPDATED with breaking news: Rangers Captain to stump for Kinsler on Thursday. Details after jump.

Listen, my email got bombarded during the 2008 primary season by the fine folks from the Clinton and Obama campaigns. I’d suggest to anybody planning on running for the 2012 nomination – looking at you, Sarah Palin – you might want to consider Rangers PR mastermind John Blake, who has peppered emails today with news that Detroit’s Brandon Inge has surpassed Ian Kinsler for the lead for the final spot on the AL All-Star roster.

There are 24 hours left in the voting. Here is the release from Major League Baseball:

NEW YORK, July 8, 2009 – Brandon Inge of the Detroit Tigers has replaced Ian Kinsler of the Texas Rangers atop the American League ballot heading into the final 24 hours of the 2009 All-Star Game Sprint Final Vote on MLB.com and the individual Club sites.  Over the last few hours, Pablo Sandoval of the San Francisco Giants has again re-taken the lead in the National League over Shane Victorino, but only after the Philadelphia Phillies outfielder jumped in front last night.

Sandoval and Victorino are separated by just two percentage points and the voting is so close that this race for the final roster spot on the 2009 National League All-Star Team has already seen at least five different lead changes. Mark Reynolds of the Arizona Diamondbacks continues to surge in third place as he is followed in the standings by Matt Kemp of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Cristian Guzman of the Washington Nationals.

Inge surpassed Kinsler last night and continues to hold a slim lead of only nine percent entering these final 24 hours of balloting for the American League All-Star Team’s final roster spot. Chone Figgins of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, Carlos Pena of the Tampa Bay Rays and Adam Lind of the Toronto Blue Jays have accumulated more than two million votes each.

With one day left to determine the winners, balloting remains ahead of last year’s record pace as 34.3 million votes have been cast. After a final early morning update tomorrow, the winners will be announced shortly after the conclusion of the balloting at 4 p.m. (EDT).

Mobile voting is available exclusively on Sprint capable mobile phones and fans can send the word “Vote” to 1122 to receive the 2009 All-Star Game Sprint Final Vote ballot. Standard text rates apply. In Canada, fans should text the word “Vote” to 88555.

And this from the Rangers:

Arlington, Texas—Rangers Captain will be campaigning for Ian Kinsler during the final hours of the 2009 All-Star Game Sprint Final Vote on Thursday.

The Rangers mascot will be appearing at the Texas Rangers Team Shop in downtown Fort Worth on Thursday from 12 noon until 1:00 p.m. to encourage the lunchtime crowd to cast their votes for Kinsler during the final hours of the 2009 All-Star Game Sprint Final Vote. The voting ends at 3:00 p.m. CT on Thursday.

The Rangers Team Shop is located at 316 Main St. in Sundance Square. The store carries a full line of men’s, women’s, and children’s team apparel as well as Rangers novelties and serves as a full service ticket office, accommodating both individual game purchases and season ticket holder sales and exchanges.

Kinsler is currently running second to Detroit’s Brandon Inge in the voting for the 33^rd and final spot on the American League team. That All-Star is being selected in on-line fan balloting in the 2009 All-Star Game Sprint Final Vote on texasrangers.com/allstar that continues until Thursday, July 9 at 3:00 p.m. CT.