Baseball’s All-Star Game was once a cutthroat battle between two distinct and competitive entities, one of just two times all season that the leagues interacted. The game was played largely by the very best players in baseball, and those players often went the distance. If you wanted to see Babe Ruth face Carl Hubbell, or Bob Feller take on Stan Musial, or Warren Spahn pitch to Ted Williams, the All-Star Game was just about your only hope.
In the modern era, the All-Star Game has been reduced to the final act of a three-day festival, in recent seasons often overshadowed by the previous night’s Home Run Derby. Rather than a grudge match between rivals, it’s an interconference game like the NFL, NBA, and NHL events. The individual matchups, once unique, have been diluted by interleague play. Perhaps the biggest difference, however, is how the managers and players approach the game.
In the first All-Star Game back in 1933, the starting lineups went the distance. The AL made just one position-player substitition, getting legs in for Babe Ruth late in the game. In the NL, the top six hitters in the lineup took all their at-bats. Each team used three pitchers. A quarter-century later, this was still the general idea: seven of the eight NL position-player starters in the 1958 game went the distance, five AL hitters did, and the teams used just four pitchers each. The best players in baseball showed up trying to win to prove their league’s superiority.
Then it all went awry. Before interleague play or 32-man rosters or All-Star Monday, there were the years of two All-Star Games. From 1959 through 1962, the AL and NL met twice each summer as a means of raising revenues for the players’ fledgling pension fund. In ’58, 32 players played in the All-Star Game, 12 of them staying for the entire game. In 1963, the first year after the experiment, 41 players played and just five went the distance. The 1979 game, one of the all-time best contests, saw 49 players used and had just three starters who were around at the end. Fast-forward to 2007-the last nine-inning All-Star Game-and you find 55 players in, 17 pitchers used to get 54 outs, and not a single starter left in the game at its conclusion.
The All-Star Game has lost its luster because the game isn’t taken seriously by the people in uniform. Don’t read what they say-watch what they do. That’s the damning evidence that the participants care less about winning than they do about showing up. Tying home-field advantage in the World Series to the game didn’t change a thing to arrest the trends of managers running the game like it’s gym class. Should World Series home-field advantage be decided when some Oriole having the best first half on his team singles off of some National having the best first half of his? Expansion accounts for the larger rosters-up to 33, including an absurd 13 pitchers, for next week’s showdown-but no one is forcing the managers to use everyone. They and the players can play the game the way it was played in 1958, they’re simply choosing not to. That’s what’s taking the Midsummer Classic down the garden path to becoming the Pro Bowl.
The damage done to the All-Star Game is the inevitable end product of every change Bud Selig has made during his reign. Selig has worked to bring together the two leagues operationally, eliminating league presidents, separate umpiring crews, and alternating picks in the draft. He’s also diluted the mystery of the individual circuits with three weeks of cross-league games each season, some teams playing as many as six times every year. By the time Roy Halladay faces Brian McCann in St. Louis, well, we’ve already seen that (McCann went 2-for-2 against Doc on May 22), and a dozen other matchups just like it.
Selig isn’t backing off on interleague play, and the shift from distinct leagues to MLB conferences is permanent. So if you want to fix the All-Star Game, there’s just one thing left to do: Leave the starters in. The single biggest change to this game in the last 50 years is that the elected starters make cameo appearances for an at-bat, for three innings in the field, then leave. Albert Pujols is the game’s greatest player, and he has just 15 All-Star Game plate appearances in his eight seasons to date. Derek Jeter is as famous as any player alive, and he has 19 PAs in his 13 seasons, including nine All-Star Games. Johan Santana has never thrown more than an inning in an All-Star Game, and has a career total of three. Halladay has four career All-Star innings. None of this can possibly be good for the game, or for the Game. These are your most marketable stars, and they are making cameos rather than taking the lead.
You can talk all you want about larger rosters, larger leagues, the need to protect pitchers and the number of players who beg out of the festivities, but when you run the game like everyone’s grabbing orange slices and juice boxes after it, interest wanes. Some guys will have to get used to the idea that being selected is the honor, while the best players in baseball, the game’s top stars, get the most playing time. That’s what made baseball’s All-Star Game the best of its kind, and it’s the only thing that will get us to care about it again.
Thank you for reading
This is a free article. If you enjoyed it, consider subscribing to Baseball Prospectus. Subscriptions support ongoing public baseball research and analysis in an increasingly proprietary environment.
Subscribe now
The problem with this is that there was no outcry that the ASG starter going three innings was putting him at risk for injury. There was no outcry that pitchers or position players were being abused in the game. The ASG didn't change as a response to any of that. The ONLY thing we saw was a concern for pitchers who had just pitched the Sunday before or whatever.
After that...eh.
That's two players per position and enough pitchers to last 18 innings. Oh, and get rid of "the every team gets a rep" rule except for the host team. Thanks to Joe Torre we might have to put a limit on the number of players taken from one team. I know it was really Selig's fault for letting Joe do it, but we need to stop that.
And, finally, get rid of the inane home-field advantage thing.
Shows my general lack of interest in the NL.
I'm afraid it's too late. It already *is* the Pro Bowl of baseball, except that the Pro Bowl players were mostly good for an entire season before being selected. Pity, but there we are.
And I would watch the All-Star Game until the precise moment that this player entered the game.
In 1987, this was in extra innings, as Tabler made his lone plate appearance. (He did not get a hit. Regardless of the setting, he was still Pat Tabler.) But generally speaking, I wanted to see MY PLAYER in the All-Star Game. Yes, it's fun to see some of the matchups. but without MY PLAYER, this game is completely pointless.
Last year I got to turn the game off after two innings, as Cliff Lee started the game. Huzzah! But a fan of such a team (today's Pirates, Royals, Nationals, or, sadly, the Indians once again) wants to see That Player make an appearance. It is probably not good for the game, the Game, or the gamy Game, but it is probably not a unique sentiment.
The second game would consist of the reserve hitters from the first game plus the other Players and Managers choices with an additional 5 pitchers on each team available (plus any pitchers unused from the first game.)
The first game would count and the second could be used to get everyone in the game.
Can you even begin to contemplate what would happen if a starting pitcher from a competitive team gets injured pitching into the 6th or later? Because he's being pushed by a manager from a team he's competing against in a meaningless game?
The All-Star Game feels like a three-day carnival because that's precisely what it should be.
This game is completely and utterly meaningless. What has HFA given the AL the last few seasons. The World Series titles are pretty evenly split.
Is there anyone, anywhere who's even contemplating watching the ASG who hasn't seen Albert Pujols hit? Who thinks to themselves, "you know who I never hear about? Derek Jeter! Boy, I sure wish I could see him hit someday....?"
Thinking about this charitably, maybe Joe is just stuck in the past. I mean, I remember All-Star games from my formative years (the early 1980s) pretty fondly. Outside of my hometown Orioles, TWIB Notes, and the Game of the Week, I almost never got to see the game's best play. So yeah, it was really cool to finally get to see Wade Boggs work the count, Rickey Henderson steal second and third, Roger Clemens throwing gas, and so on.
But today? You've got the MLB network, MLB tv., the MLB package on DirecTV, SportsCenter, Baseball Tonight, and YouTube. I can watch every Albert Pujols at-bat of the season if I want to. I can even program my DVR to record every time Derek Jeter muffs an easy grounder to his right.
So it seems to me that, if anything, the ASG needs *more* of the guys that maybe your average baseball fan doesn't yet know to watch. More Ben Zobrists, more Pablo Sandovals, more Matt Kemps and Brian McCanns.
I do agree with Joe that interleague play cheapens and takes some of the mystery out of the ASG; you don't have to wonder how Mark Teixeira will do against Johan Santana, because you've already watched that game if you care. But again, this seems kind of stuck in a 1950s mindset; you also know how Teixeira will do against Johan because Tex played in the National League for parts of the last two seasons.
So again, I'm left with a set of complaints that seems kind of detached from reality. Where's the BP thinking-outside-the-box here? Why not talk about the Futures Game in contrast? Maybe the solution is a Rookies and Sophmores vs. Old-Timers setup. I don't know -- but I know that I'm not really getting good answers (or even, it seems, good questions) from Joe.
But one doesn't just want to see the best players; one wants to see them COMPETE against each other and try to beat each other.
1) Fans still vote, but their selections don't determine the starting lineups. They want Josh Hamilton? Sure, but Torii Hunter is starting in centerfield.
2) 25 man roster - 16 hitters, 9 pitchers
3) The DH is always in effect
4) No team representation requirement
5) Three inning limit on pitchers
Generally, I enjoy the All-Star festivities as a celebration of baseball's greatest players. I like watching the home run derby (though it's now far too long) to see the boppers go deep and all the fun the players have with their kids on the field. However, I really like watching great hitters square off with great pitchers when both take it seriously.
The game itself is a total blast every year.
The ASG has become purely a marketing event for MLB without actually promoting its stars. That's my definition of a strict money-grab.
I don't really mind this change. The focus of the game has been turned toward players, rather than the structural drama of the game that owners have more of a stake in. It is in line with how the game is being marketed right now.
Tremendous line!
Here's a little exercise for the reader. Consider the following list of players active in the 1960s, which happens to be the decade when I was growing up: Max Alvis, Nelson Briles, Frank Malzone, Cookie Rojas, Johnny Temple. Exactly one of these players didn't appear in at least one all-star game; name him. (Hint: he's also the only one who had either an ERA+ or OPS+ above average for his career.) Then name the positions they all played. And ask yourself what Hall of Famers were sent (or, from the beginning of the game, kept) off the field so that each of these luminaries could play. Each one of them, except that one above-average no-show, substituted into an ASG for someone now in Cooperstown.
There's nothing new about this phenomenon, Joe. The good old days weren't necessarily all that good. And the fans of Alvis, etc., were just as glad to see their home-town boys get into the game, scrubs or not, as Ben Zobrist's and Tim Wakefield's fans are today.
Personally, I don't care about the ASG one way or the other. The only thing I like about it are the pointless debates we have every year about whether the right people make it or not. I don't know if I've ever watched the game all the way through and I don't think anything could. For me, it's three days with no real baseball, i.e. the worst three days of the summer.
I guess the point of this history lesson is that, aside from the late 40s to mid 50s, there's really never been a time when the teams were full of the best players, the players cared about winning, and the fans were part of the process.
In 1958, six of the nine NL starters were future Hall of Famers. There were also seven future HOFers on the AL side, but only Mantle and Aparicio started. Ted Williams, Al Kaline, and Yogi Berra came off the bench. The ones who played the entire game, by the way, included Mays, Musial, Aaron, Banks, Mazeroski, and Mantle. I think "the best players are trying to win" is a good description 1950s ASGs.
Look: this kind of thing happens, and happened, all the time. The only reason it seems more extreme now, other than the admitted fact that some of the big guys (and some not so big ones) did play the whole game back then, is the larger number of subs to run in. That is probably an inescapable result of the increase in the size of the rosters -- even though the rosters haven't increased in size by as large a factor as the size of the leagues they represent. Sorry, but I simply am not finding this analysis very compelling.
But it was also not uncommon for the big guys to play the whole game. In that 1955 game, four of the six guys who went the distance were future HOFers. That is a difference from the way the game is played today. Whether that made it a better game is another issue entirely.
One other thing: Johnny Logan received votes for MVP every year from 1952 to 1957. I don't think that his modest career OPS+ tells the whole story.
As someone else posted, I get to see plenty of AL and NL players already, and inter-league and WS gives me all the head to head I could need.
People can say back in the day the players cared more, but the game was a very different beast than it is today with all the money riding on getting teams to the post season.
[Note: doesn't solve the injury potential, which IMO is the biggest risk, either way]
Eggs-actly. The primary goal of the modern day ASG manager is to get as many of his players into the game while hoping against hope that he doesn't run out of pitchers. Bizarrely, his secondary goal is to win the game.
That's not what I want to see, and it's why I barely pay attention to the ASG anymore. I want to see the best players in the world trying like hell -- within reasonable limits -- to win the game.
especially here at BP ... it's as if every RBI he gets is actually a negative stat
Deciding Justin Morneau is unappreciated by the media is a bit like wondering when Michael Jackson's death is going to to get some attention.
keep ASG an exhibition.
if interleague play is here to stay, and selig feels need to have WS home field based on something, then make it dependent on interleague series total record. let it be dtermined by real games, etc that "count". everyone happy, right? although that means AL will be home field for forseeable future...
i blame that evil curt flood and meddling marvin miller for the death of the ASG...
When the two leagues were really separate entities, league championships were very important. The World Series was still the ultimate goal, but there was some kind of fan satisfaction inherent in winning your league pennant. With the two leagues basically becoming two conferences, the playoffs are just a tournament with only one goal--winning the World Series. If the leagues aren't seen as two separate entities, the league pennant just doesn't matter that much, and the World Series is too large a factor in fan satisfaction.
Why will this ultimately hurt the game? Because of expansion. Just as the divisional split came about because expansion made the leagues too large to give all fans hope of seeing their team win a championship, combining the leagues has done the same thing. Even in a league with perfect competitive balance, each team would only win the World Series every 30 years. Since that's impossible, we're going to see a lot of championship droughts that last decades and longer.
Cities with long baseball histories seem to be able to sustain teams in those situations (e.g., the Red and White Sox until this decade and the Cubs), but how are people in Toronto going to feel in 2050 if their team still hasn't won (or even gotten to) a World Series since the early 1990s?
Separating the leagues again would help solve this possibly non-existent problem (as well as making the ASG more interesting). I don't have any kind of workable, practical solution in mind, but I'd hate to see fans in 10 or more cities give up on baseball because their team hasn't won a World Series in 75 years.
Sorry for writing so long on something that's only tangentially related to Joe's article. It's just something I've been thinking about and wondering how other people felt about it.
A point that is not mentioned is the movement of players either by trade of free agency. Players switching leagues may not occur as often players changing teams within a league, but I have to think that several of the All-Star players have faced each other simply because they have have switched leagues.
"The All-Star Game has lost its luster because the game isn’t taken seriously by the people in uniform. Don’t read what they say—watch what they do."
Did you watch the game last year? When Terry Francona hugged Jim Leyland and was moved to tears after the game, he didn't care? When Justin Morneau jumped into the arms of Carlos Quentin (who plays on the team's biggest division rival) after a 15 inning walk-off, he didn't care? Terry Francona was going to have JD Drew (his team's second-most expensive player) pitch!
I don't understand how you get away with this stuff. Why don't you "watch what they do?"
http://www.mlb.com/media/video.jsp?mid=200807163140776
Watch Ichiro gun down Pujols, look at how Cueto reacts to giving up the homer to Drew. Look at Tejada's play at short and McLouth's throw to the plate. Hell, look at Hart's throw on the final play of the game. These aren't plays by players who don't care (compare this game to, say, a Mets game).
I can wait for your next article about how the media ignores the important facts. I'm glad Baseball Prospectus has its own Skip Bayless.
Sorry
I have no idea what you're talking about.
But we need more competitive balance in baseball! There are only 11 teams left in the hunt for a postseason birth! Oh wait...there are still 20 teams either leading their division, leading the wild card, or within 5 games of a playoff birth as of right now? Nevermind...