MLB All-Star game - Who's Watching It?

[WSUCougar]

I know many of you are disgusted with the All-Star game and/or MLB in general, by I for one am going to tune in tonight. All the Fox hype aside, I think that making it determine the home field advantage isn't such a bad idea. Why? Because the managers now will manage to win, rather than to get everyone in the game. I feel that biggest, inherent flaw in all-star games is the goofy tendency to make it into a "fun" exhibition that has no resemblance to the real deal. I say bring it on.

Plus, in addition to the five Cardinals on the N.L. squad, there are a lot of players I am eager to see.

Anyone else...?

[vtbub]

I'm looking forward to it.

[primelord]

I'll also be watching, though I do admit it helps having the first 3 guys in the NL lineup being Cardinals.

[Marmel]

I watch every year. I am no more or less excited about it this season than in previous ones. I do think the AL is going to get blasted though, what a marginal 'All-Star' team it seems to be on paper. Should be interesting though.

[SteelerFan448]

I'll watch it. Not because of the stupid rule that the winner's league gets homefield advantage. Give it to the darn team with the better record. I won't watch it because managers manage to win. I'm a Pirates fan, and even though Mike Williams isn't deserving, he is the Pirates rep in the game and I want to see him play. I'm watching it cause it's a collection of baseballs best players having fun with eachother, in what should be an exhibition. I was lucky enough to go to the 1994 All-Star game in Pittsburgh, wow, what a game that was!

[illinifan999]

I still don't understand why the team with the better record doesnt get the home field.

[MylesKnight]

NADA!! I'll be out on the Links until around 9'ish, this evening..

After that, some playing around with the Kids, a quick check of the going's on Online and then Bedtime.

Baseball? Where?

[clintl]

I'll probably watch it, although I don't have as much interest as I used to.

[albionmoonlight]

I think that exibitions should be for fun and should not count, though I also think that it is nice to see baseball trying to shake things up. You never know until you try.

It is too late now, but I think that one way for baseball to have the all star game matter is to have had it remain one of the few games that matched up the distinct AL and NL.

One distinction that baseball had going for it over the other 3 big sports is that the division into leagues/conferences meant something more than geography. Had I been in charge, I would have increased that distinction, not diminished it.

First, I would not have had interleague play.
Second, I would have made it harder for players to switch leagues in Free Agency. Maybe make a team that signs a player from another league pay a 15% fee to MLB or something. Such a rule would have encouraged players to stay within a league and teams to keep players within a certain league.

Of course, when interleague play and widespread free agency destroys the individuality of the two leagues, the all star game will mean less. As I said above, I don't think that the game really should "matter." But MLB's solution seems to be an attempt at a quick fix to a deeper situation.

[VPI97]

I'm disappointed that the Red to get in was Boone (Dunn & Kearnes have been more valuable to the team), but that's where the opening was, so I'll live with it. Anyway, I'll be watching tonight.

[WSUCougar]

Good points, albionmoonlight.

To counter the "exhibition" mindset, I feel that it falsifies what the sport is about. Why have a game at all, if it's just an exhibition? An exhibition of what? Skills? Have a bunch of skill contests like the homerun derby.

I watch MLB to see the best baseball players in the world compete against each other. On a double-play ball, I expect baserunner Scott Rolen to try and take out the secondbaseman. In an exhibition game, there's always people oohing and ahhing about the propriety of such a thing. That's baseball, man.

What about inside pitching? You think Pedro Martinez should not pitch inside because it's an exhibition? Pete Rose going into Ray Fosse...it goes on and on.

My two bits.

[JeeberD]

I'll be working from 4 to 1030, so no All-Star game for me. Sucks that the only Astro is Wagner, though. Kent (if he wasn't injured), Ensberg, Dotel, and Lidge desereved consideration, and Hidalgo is having a really good year, he should have been given a thought or two...

I watched some of the Home Run Derby last night and enjoyed it. Shocked to see that Anderson pulled it out...

[Swaggs]

I'm with SteelersFan on this one.

Even though a lot of people hate the mandatory player from each team rule, that is the reason I watch the game. I want to see how my (usually one) Pirates player does.

I always watched and waited to see the Pirate get into the game--usually Tony Pena, when I was a kid. I can remember how thrilled I was back in the early 90s when three Buccos made the team (I believe they were Bonds, Bonilla, and Neal Heaton).

[vtbub]

Drabek must have been an all-star?

[Ksyrup]

I am, although I hate the All-Star break because it takes away 3 good days of regualr baseball games. Even with the HR Derby last night, I was still going through withdrawals.

That's one thing football will never have on baseball - you can watch several games every day of the week.

[primelord]

Originally posted by WSUCougar
On a double-play ball, I expect baserunner Scott Rolen to try and take out the secondbaseman. In an exhibition game, there's always people oohing and ahhing about the propriety of such a thing. That's baseball, man.

If Rolen injures himself more than he already is trying to break up a double play I am holding you responsible.

[Swaggs]

Originally posted by vtbub
Drabek must have been an all-star?

I'm not certain, but I do not believe Drabek ever made an All Star team with the Pirates, although he may have with the Astros later on.

[WSUCougar]

Originally posted by primelord
If Rolen injures himself more than he already is trying to break up a double play I am holding you responsible.

That'd be our luck...

Joe Buck: Here's a grounder to A-Rod, he flips to Boone at second with Rolen bearing down on him, and OH! He's decapitated!!!

[primelord]

Originally posted by Swaggs
I'm not certain, but I do not believe Drabek ever made an All Star team with the Pirates, although he may have with the Astros later on.

Yea his only All-Star appearance was in 94 with the Astros. How do you win a Cy Young award and not make the all-star game?

[Draft Dodger]

I'm just watching for Zito

[primelord]

Originally posted by VPI97
I'm disappointed that the Red to get in was LaRue (Dunn & Kearnes have been more valuable to the team), but that's where the opening was, so I'll live with it. Anyway, I'll be watching tonight.

You consider Dunn to be valuable to the Reds? The 25 HR's are fine and dandy, but considering he is hitting .202w 100 K's and a .345 OBP I would say he hasn't been all that valuable. Also the .149 with runners in scoring position and .065 with runners in scoring position with 2 outs doesn't bode well. So far Dunn just seems like a a larger version of Pete Incaviglia.

[TLK]

Originally posted by Draft Dodger
I'm just watching for Zito

For the shady way they handled the situation, I'm hoping for a barn-burner, maybe 6 up going into the ninth. Then I want rain, lots of rain. That'd be another tie.....

[Leonidas]

On too late for me, just like the WS. Once again, baseball is the only sport that insists all of its important games need to be on really late, and once again it will have lower ratings than the other sports and they won't understand why.

[primelord]

Originally posted by Leonidas
On too late for me, just like the WS. Once again, baseball is the only sport that insists all of its important games need to be on really late, and once again it will have lower ratings than the other sports and they won't understand why.

You consider 8 p.m. really late? I would think waiting untill 8 EST will actually increase the ratings since the west coast will all be home from work in time to watch the start of the game.

[clintl]

Anything earlier would kill the West Coast audience completely.

[EagleFan]

Just to play with the conspiracy theories here. Think about this home field advantage idea. Let's say you're an all-star from say the Mets and you're hearing rumors of a possible trade to the Yankees. It's the 9th inning and your team is down by a run, how much do you really care about the NL getting home field advantage.

Your possible future looks to be:
A) Stay with the Mets and watch the playoffs from home, who cares about home field advantage.
or
B) Get traded to the Yankees and maybe have the home field advantage in the WS, if the NL should lose the game (which may now be in your hands).

I'm not talking about specific players or anything, just a possible situation that could arrise. Just food for thought.

[Craptacular]

An incomplete list of things more likely than the All-Star game to be on my TV tonight:
8 Simple Rules
According to Jim
Tour de France
British Open Preview
Louis Farrakhan
CSPAN
Worlds' Best Megastructures
Gemstone Celebration
Cher: The Farewell Tour
CSPAN2
Holy Rosary
SpongeBob SquarePants
Skateboarding
Madison Common Council
.
.
.
and even Larry King

[EagleFan]

I'm leaning towards the World Series of Poker, I think that's on tonight.

[Cards4ever]

Originally posted by primelord
You consider 8 p.m. really late? I would think waiting untill 8 EST will actually increase the ratings since the west coast will all be home from work in time to watch the start of the game.

I've always thought that the All-Star game would benefit with a change to a weekend format, with the game being played with a first pitch of 7 eastern, cause we all know that the first pitch won't be until about a half hour or so after they go on the air.

Back to my original point, have the HR derby Saturday night and the game on Sunday, but I doubt the owners want to give up a weekend of gate at their home parks.

[Leonidas]

Originally posted by primelord
You consider 8 p.m. really late? I would think waiting untill 8 EST will actually increase the ratings since the west coast will all be home from work in time to watch the start of the game.

First, check when the game really starts (I bet it will be closer to 9 than 8). Then check what time the game ends (sure to be around 1200). I'm up at 6 am every day. I'm not gonna stay up till past midnight to watch a game unless I have a really vested interest in who's playing.

Now for my age old argument against baseball gametimes. The Superbowl starts at 6 pm and blows the doors off WS ratings. I can sort of understand how they time things on weekdays, but there is no excuse to have all your WS games played on a weekend start at 8:30 or 9 pm. Even the NBA playoffs were more reasonable. When they say an NBA game starts at 8, they mean 8. And the games are over by 10-1030. Typical WS game is listed to start at 8, first pitch is more like 845 and the game doesn't end till midnight. There's a problem here and the lords of baseball don't get it.

[vtbub]

Originally posted by Leonidas
First, check when the game really starts (I bet it will be closer to 9 than 8). Then check what time the game ends (sure to be around 1200). I'm up at 6 am every day. I'm not gonna stay up till past midnight to watch a game unless I have a really vested interest in who's playing.

Now for my age old argument against baseball gametimes. The Superbowl starts at 6 pm and blows the doors off WS ratings. I can sort of understand how they time things on weekdays, but there is no excuse to have all your WS games played on a weekend start at 8:30 or 9 pm. Even the NBA playoffs were more reasonable. When they say an NBA game starts at 8, they mean 8. And the games are over by 10-1030. Typical WS game is listed to start at 8, first pitch is more like 845 and the game doesn't end till midnight. There's a problem here and the lords of baseball don't get it.

Well let's not compare apples to oranges, no WS game has gotten the ratings of a Super Bowl in modern times. The NBA Finals got very bad ratings this year. MNF starts at 9:17 every week and it's a top 10 program. WS games still win their timeslots on TV, despite the late starts and the sloooooow play.

[tucker342]

I might watch it if NCAA Football hasn't arrived by then, if it does, there is no chance

[MrBug708]

Originally posted by primelord
Yea his only All-Star appearance was in 94 with the Astros. How do you win a Cy Young award and not make the all-star game?

Ask Kirk Gibson, the 88 MVP

[Ksyrup]

This is a snippet from Tom Verducci's column defending the new All-star game rules, sort of a point-counterpoint format:

"One game should not decide something as important as World Series homefield advantage. Fact: World Series homefield advantage had been determined by the whim of the calendar -- alternating leagues on an annual basis. There was no system of merit in place before. Some players on Monday argued that the team with the better record should have the advantage, completely ignorant of the fact that it's logistically impossible for baseball to wait until the League Championship Series are over to find out where the World Series will begin -- not to mention the fact that the AL and NL teams play completely different schedules."

Now, I agree that the alternating years concept is stupid, but what I don't understand is why it is "logistically impossible" for baseball to use the "best record" format to determine home field. Am I missing something here? What makes baseball different from the NHL or NBA? Isn't that how they determine home court/ice? If they can deal with little advance notice, why can't baseball?

Seriously, can someone explain this to me, because this isn't the first place I've read this argument, and no one has really explained why baseball is unique in this regard.

[Blade]

I will be watching it...not sure why, but I am slowly becoming a Baseball fan again...

[MizzouRah]

Originally posted by primelord
I'll also be watching, though I do admit it helps having the first 3 guys in the NL lineup being Cardinals.

This will be my first all-star game watching in quite some time. Isn't nice to see all the redbirds in it this year? LaRussa looks like a kid out there.

Dusty Baker has to feel giddy with this lineup and pitching staff!



Todd

[clintl]

Another All-Star Game farce - From my e-mail inbox today:

2003 All-Star Game MVP Vote presented by Pepsi
WHO DESERVES TO BE MVP?
FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER, FANS GET TO VOTE.
VOTE FOR ALL-STAR MVP AT MLB.COM
Beginning in the 3rd inning
Exclusively on MLB.com

[oykib]

Originally posted by WSUCougar
That'd be our luck...

Joe Buck: Here's a grounder to A-Rod, he flips to Boone at second with Rolen bearing down on him, and OH! He's decapitated!!!

(the late)Mel Allen: How about that?!

Seriously, I'm watching. This is one of the few games that comes on regular TV. Other than this, I can only count on Yankees-Mariners games and the playoffs.

[oykib]

I hope this game means something. If it does, then Bonds'll stay in. If he does, he's gonna send one out.

[SteelerFan448]

Not too exciting right now outside of Schmidt getting Martinez in the head with a pitch. I like to see the 9-8 games for an All-Star game. Pitchers are ruling this game so far, 1-0 A.L.

[oykib]

Shigetoshi Hasegawa just came in. He's actually a local boy. There are pictures of him all over the batting center around here. They also have some of his memorobilia.

[Ksyrup]

Did anyone notice that they flashed two different graphics about Larry Doby's lifespan - the first showed that he was born in 1923, the second showed that he was born in 1924. Dolbygate!

[oykib]

Well, Hasegawa just laid an egg.

I think I jinxed him. I'd be suprised if he'd given up more than one HR during the regular season. I'm worse than an SI cover.

[PineTar]

Until the advent of interleague play, it would have been utterly stupid to rely on the best record to determine home field advantage. Take for instance the 1977 expansion (Seattle and Toronto) season. The AL teams were benefitting from playing two teams that had been formed from a draft of the dregs of the other teams' systems (the expansion draft has become more favorable in recent years and expansion teams don't start from such a deep hole as in the past.)

Would it really have been fair to award home field advantage to the Yankees that year (100 wins) over the Dodgers (98 wins) due to their intraleague regular season record knowing full well that they were playing two basically AAAA teams? Nope

Even today with interleague play in baseball, hockey and basketball incorporate a more significant number of games between "leagues". If there is in inordinate quantity of talent in one league over another (like in The FOBL's 2010 Gindin League, it just isn't fair to let records benefit an inferior {Vaughan} League.

Hope that helps.

[oykib]

Yeah, but, Pinetar, isn't that closer to fair than this All-Star nonsense or the alternating system?

Sometimes a 100-win team that's really better than the 103-win team from the other league will get jobbed. But you won't have a situation like now where you could have either league's central winner (who could concievably be at or barely above .500) with homefield.

[Ksyrup]

Originally posted by PineTar
Until the advent of interleague play, it would have been utterly stupid to rely on the best record to determine home field advantage. Take for instance the 1977 expansion (Seattle and Toronto) season. The AL teams were benefitting from playing two teams that had been formed from a draft of the dregs of the other teams' systems (the expansion draft has become more favorable in recent years and expansion teams don't start from such a deep hole as in the past.)

Would it really have been fair to award home field advantage to the Yankees that year (100 wins) over the Dodgers (98 wins) due to their intraleague regular season record knowing full well that they were playing two basically AAAA teams? Nope

Even today with interleague play in baseball, hockey and basketball incorporate a more significant number of games between "leagues". If there is in inordinate quantity of talent in one league over another (like in The FOBL's 2010 Gindin League, it just isn't fair to let records benefit an inferior {Vaughan} League.

Hope that helps.

That sounds perfectly reasonable, except for the fact that the argument against MLB using best records to determine home field has less to do with the relative strengths of each league, as it does with the advance notice of where the next series will be played. That's the argument Verducci and others make. That's what is confusing to me - I don't see a difference. It might be fairer to use best records to determine home court/ice in the NBA/NHL, but they still have the same short notice that baseball would, once the winners of each series are determined. So how is that "logistically impossible" for baseball, but not a problem for hockey and basketball?

[Daimyo]

The advance notice argument seems silly to me.... Knowing which league has home field advantage doesn't really help at all for making arrangements in a specific city.

IMO, awarding the game to the winner of the all-star game is definately no worse than alternating it (or doing it randomly), so if it adds a little excitement to the game... why not?

[Ksyrup]

This was Selig's comment yesterday, from a Jayson Stark article:

The commish also continued to insist that awarding home-field advantage in the Series to the team with the best regular-season record isn't practical, because "we need 10,000-12,000 hotel rooms for the World Series, and we just can't do it in 24 hours."


Again, I don't know the numbers, and maybe these types of figures dwarf what the NHL and NBA need, but what's the difference?

I also thought this comment about having a rep from each team was probably not phrased as well as it could have been:

"I'm the commissioner. And the message you send (if you take away a team's All-Star) causes a lot of distress to that team. And when you sit in my chair, you'd better be very careful. So I'm very reluctant to start eliminating teams."

Oh really?

[Alan T]

Originally posted by Swaggs
I'm not certain, but I do not believe Drabek ever made an All Star team with the Pirates, although he may have with the Astros later on.

I think if I remember right, wasn't Zane Smith an allstar with the Pirates at one point?

[henry296]

Alan,

I believe you are right, perhaps it was in 92. The Pirates traded Moises Alou to get Smith.

Todd