MLB All-Star Game Is Best Of The Bunch — Don’t Alter It To Suit Critics

It is by far the most successful and entertaining of all the All-Star Games. Major League Baseball’s annual Mid-Summer Classic features the best of both the American and National League playing the same game that is played basically every day during the spring, summer and early fall – without any of the gimmicks that the other major North American pro sports have installed.

The NFL knows its Pro Bowl has turned into a disaster, and commissioner Roger Goodell has all but waved the white flag by turning it into a touch football game. The NBA’s All-Star Game eschews defense and has been transformed into two captains – LeBron and Giannis – picking their own teams. The NHL tries hard with their 3-on-3 regular-season overtime format, but it simply falls short of significance and entertainment value.

The 2023 MLB All-Star Game is clearly head and shoulders above the competition, but it will not feature the best players in the game. The American League team – dominant for nearly 40 years in the competition – is battered and bruised this year. Aaron Judge of the Yankees, Mike Trout of the Angels and Yordan Alvarez of the Astros are injured and will not play, and these are three of the best hitters in the league.

Shohei Ohtani, the best player on the planet who is inching up on Babe Ruth, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron and Ted Williams on the all-time rankings, will get in the batter’s box and hit. However, he won’t pitch in the game due to a blister on his finger.

The American League team has won nine games in a row and has put together a run of 21-3-1 in the last 25 games, comparable to National League’s dominance of winning 19 times in 20 games between 1963 and 1982.

Forty years ago, the American League ended years of futility on a steamy summer night at Chicago’s Comiskey Park. The National League swaggered into the South Side of Chicago expecting to win once again, but the American League created a seismic shift in the series when Fred Lynn of the California Angels launched the only grand slam in the history of the series in the third inning off of San Francisco pitcher Atlee Hammaker.

That was the key moment in the American League’s 13-3 victory that also featured another home run by Lynn’s former Red Sox teammate Jim Rice.

No American League hitter has ever had greater success in the All-Star Game than Lynn, who mashed 4 home runs in his nine summer showcase appearances.

Lynn remembers the domination the NL had in the game going up to his pivotal moment, and he said his team often struggled because of the unfamiliarity with the opponent’s hurlers. “We never saw their pitchers in those days,” Lynn said. “It made it very difficult to know what was coming.”

While that’s an excellent point, the National League hitters had the same issue and managed to overcome that for two decades.

It’s fairly easy to look back at those days and understand the reason for the NL’s dominance for 20 years. They were led by brilliant players of color like Mays, Aaron, Roberto Clemente and Joe Morgan, while the American League didn’t have a black superstar until the Baltimore Orioles traded for Frank Robinson prior to the 1966 season.

There are several mainstream publications like The Athletic and Boston Globe that have advocated for change in the All-Star Game that would eliminate the AL vs. NL competition and turn it into a US vs. the World or a captain selection kind of game.

Those are faulty and awful positions. This is the best of the All-Star games and it is not broken. It needs to be celebrated – not castrated by thoughtless headline seekers or the sport’s executives who want to see change for change’s sake.