Eureka High School product Ben Zobrist of the Tampa Bay Rays was named to the American League All-Star team on Sunday.

Zobrist entered Sunday night's game at Texas having already established career highs in home runs (16), games (74) and at bats (220). He was hitting .286 with 46 RBIs and a .609 slugging percentage prior to Sunday's game. He's also scored 43 runs and stolen eight bases.

The game is July 14 at Busch Stadium in St. Louis.

"It's going to be extremely special because St. Louis was my first baseball town in the big leagues that I'd ever been to a game," Zobrist told the St. Petersburg Times. "It'll be very special to play in probably the only All-Star Game I would ever have the chance to play in in St. Louis."

The AL team will be managed by Tampa Bay's Joe Maddon, who picked Zobrist for his squad.

"I'm looking at everybody else that was available or eligible and I just felt that Zobrist's numbers stacked up really well," Maddon told the Times. "You have to be careful - you want to be fair to everybody else, but then you cannot be unfair to your own group at the same time. I just looked at the whole thing and I thought that Ben definitely belonged on the team also."

Although he's played a majority of his games at second base in place of the injured Akinori Iwamura, Zobrist was named to the All-Star team as an outfielder. He has played 185 1/3 errorless innings in the outfield, appearing at all three positions. He has also played shortstop and third base in addition to second base and has made just three errors.

"I feel like I'm making some strides this year, it was far beyond what I thought was going to happen coming into the year," Zobrist told the Times. "I'm very blessed."

Zobrist was among four Rays named to the squad, joining starting third baseman Evan Longoria, outfielder Carl Crawford and shortstop Jason Bartlett. Tampa Bay first baseman Carlos Pena is on the Internet ballot for the last AL roster spot.

"I'm definitely excited to see Zobrist go, I definitely think he deserved it," said Longoria.