improve his fielding and in , he was recognized as one of the top shortstops in the league when he was voted to be the starting shortstop for the National League in the 1968 All-Star Game. At the end of the season, he ranked first among the league's shortstops in range factor and, led the entire league in assists. While he also led the league in errors, he attributed this to the fact that he reached more ground balls than the average shortstop. Kessinger repeated as an All-Star in 1969, in a year which saw the entire Chicago Cubs infield join him on the 1969 All-Star team, with Kessinger and Cubs' third baseman Ron Santo in the starting line-up. In , he set a major league single-season record for shortstops by playing in 54 games without committing an error, breaking the record previously set by Chico Carrasquel in . The Cubs were in first place in the National League Eastern Division for 180 days of the 1969 season, before going 8-17 in their final 25 games, while the New York "Miracle" Mets went 37-11 in their final 48 games to clinch the Eastern Division pennant. Despite the Cubs' late-season collapse, Kessinger scored 109 runs, hit for a .273 batting average with a career-high 181 hits, including 38 doubles; second-most in the league. He led the league's shortstops in putouts, finished second in fielding percentage and once again led the entire National League in assists. He finished in 15th place in balloting for the 1969 National League Most Valuable Player Award and won his first Gold Glove Award. In his book, The Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, baseball historian Bill James cited manager Durocher's method of using his regular players everyday without any rest days as a factor in the Cubs' collapse. On September 9, 1969, Kessinger was in the batters box at Shea Stadium when a black cat emerged from under the stands. After staring at Kessinger and Santo (in the on-deck circle), it headed toward the Cubs' bench, where Durocher received a raised tail and hiss. During a July 4 interview in 1969 with then St. Louis Cardinals sportscaster Harry Caray, Cubs pitcher, Ferguson Jenkins, gave a name to Kessinger's trademark play at shortstop—"The Down Pat". Children from throughout WGN-TV's viewing audience widely copied it on playgrounds and in Little League games, and his fellow players typically stood in