Baseball Gets the All Star Game It Deserves
By Mike Cardillo
“My strong suspicion is we get the All Star Game we deserve.” Ray Velcoro, True Detective
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See what I did there? I combined a popular television show people like to talk about on the Internet with a current event sports topic. Page 2 here I come!
Maybe that was a little bit of a blog bait-and-switch, I don’t know. There probably isn’t a valid connection between the television show and the Midsummer Classic and the HBO show, although I’d wager American League manager Ned Yost owns at least three bolo ties like the Colin Farrell character — call it a detective-like hunch. Fans probably enjoyed the All Star Game back in the day a lot more — hell baseball used to stage two per season from 1959-62 — much like viewers seem to like True Detective‘s first season exponentially more than season two.
Leave it to baseball — and only baseball, naturally — to figure out a way to make a light, breezy exhibition game into a festering neon distraction. Whoops. That’s a Tool reference, which Stephen and I documented earlier this year. As it is, there are only a handful of things everyone on planet Earth can agree upon. One of them is that mosquitoes are the worst and the other is that the All Star Game shouldn’t by any form of human logic dictate home-field advantage in the World Series. That might be the entire list, actually.
Baseball being baseball once again put on its Malibu Chief of Police hat and acted like total reactionaries, man, after the 2002 All Star Game ended in a tie. That was a debacle, sure, but what should have been a story for a day or two and some easy punchlines, is still relevant because in the wake of the embarrassment Bud Selig in his infinite wisdom decided to up the ante, deciding that going forward — THIS TIME IT COUNTS.
Sigh.
Fast forward to the 2015 All Star Game and it’s worth applauding Yost, the American League manager, for trying to create an actual team of players for the American League, hence Boston super utility man Brock Holt is in the mix. Since this game “counts” and is being played in Cincinnati under National League rules it makes a lot of sense to load the roster with relievers: Dellin Betances, Glenn Perkins, Wade Davis, Zach Britton, Darren O’Day, Kelvin Herrera and Brad Boxberger are all worthy of their inclusions.
It makes more sense in a “real” game to have one of these pitchers come into the game out of the bullpen over a starter. Yes, it’s an honor for Dallas Keuchel, Chris Sale, Sonny Gray, Chris Archer, David Price and Felix Hernandez to make the team, but unless they start the game why use them? If I’m a fan of those teams I wouldn’t want a starter coming in in the third inning and wasting 20+ pitches even in a game that nominally counts.
The counter argument is that someone who doesn’t pay attention could easily scream into a radio microphone why should a relative unknown like O’Day or Boxberger determine home-field in a high-leverage situation late in the game? The easy answer is: that’s baseball. How many normal games are determined in the middle innings through relievers? We saw last October with the Royals that a lockdown bullpen can carry you to Game 7 of the World Series. (Ask Ned, whose team should be in the playoffs again this season.) Overlooking the value of these players because they don’t accrue the two major counting stats used in most standard fantasy baseball leagues — wins and saves — isn’t very smart.
Also not very smart? Any argument about the All Star Game … but that’s the world in which we live, a world where baseball doesn’t have enough confidence in itself so it tries continually to be more than it is with gimmicks in the pursuit of the almighty Neilsen rating.
On the positive side, making the All Star Game count fits in well with our current sports discourse — it gives talking heads, writers, bloggers, et al something to fume about for a week during a slow portion of the calendar. Like most sports topics it’s in one ear, out the other and nothing more than hot air (remember when people were mad eight Royals might start the game) … until you realize three months later that something that should be meaningless actually might end up with an impact on who wins the championship.
Baseball is a flat cir … oh wait, that was True Detective last year. Never mind.