MLB All-Star Game: This time it doesn’t count, and that's a good thing

The MLB All-Star Game won’t determine which league has home field advantage for the first time in 14 years, and that’s a good thing.

After 14 years of the All-Star Game “counting,” this year’s game in Miami will not “count.” By “count,” I mean the All-Star Game has been used to determine home field advantage in the World Series since 2003. Now that the All-Star Game and the World Series are no longer linked, home field advantage for the Fall Classic will be determined by the regular season records of the two pennant winners.

This makes much more sense than the farce of the All-Star Game determining home field advantage. It’s also better than the alternating year method of awarding home field advantage that preceded the All-Star Game “counting.” Awarding home field advantage to the team with the better regular season record should have been done years ago, but sometimes baseball takes a while to get where it needs to go.

The lasting image of the 7-7 tie in the 2002 All-Star Game is Bud Selig with his hands in the air, shrugging his shoulders. The game had gone 11 innings and every available pitcher on both rosters had been used. The AL used nine pitchers that year and the NL used 10. Four of the 19 pitchers threw less than an inning. The final two pitchers were Freddy Garcia for the AL and Vicente Padilla for the NL. After both had pitched two innings, it was decided to end the game as a tie.

Before the game ended in a tie, it was one of the more interesting All-Star Games. The NL jumped out to an early 4-0 lead, despite Torii Hunter robbing Barry Bonds of a home run in the bottom of the first inning. After getting robbed, Bonds continued out to his position and picked up Hunter like a rag doll when their paths crossed. This moment should be the one everyone remembered from this All-Star Game, rather than the befuddled look of Bud Selig.

After the NL led 4-0 through three innings, the AL bounced back to score a run in the fourth and another in the fifth before taking a 6-5 lead in the top of the seventh. In the bottom of the inning, Lance Berkman drove in two runs on a single off Kazuhiro Sasaki to put the NL back on top, 7-6.

In the top of the eighth, Robert Fick led off for the AL with a single against Robb Nen. Johnny Damon then struck out swinging, but Fick stole second base to put the tying run in scoring position. Fick had exactly six stolen bases during the regular season in 10 years in the big leagues, then stole a base in an All-Star Game. Crazy.

Omar Vizquel followed with a triple to right to tie the score at 7-7. That was it for the scoring because the NL couldn’t score a run against Freddy Garcia and the AL couldn’t score against Vicente Padilla. After the tie game, baseball fans had to hear the phrase “This Time It Counts” for the next decade.

Both teams used 30 players in the 2002 game. Only one player, Garret Anderson, had more than three plate appearances in a game that went 11 innings. This is what the All-Star Game had become over the years. Rather than manage to win the game, the skippers of both teams made it a priority to try to get every player some playing time.

It wasn’t always like this. The very first All-Star Game was played in 1933. The first six batters in the NL lineup played the entire game. The AL team used seven of their eight starting position players for the entire game. The only starter who didn’t play the whole game was Babe Ruth, who was replaced by Sam West on defense in the top of the ninth inning. Each team used just three pitchers.

For many years, the All-Star Game was a competitively played game even though it didn’t “count” as anything but an exhibition. Players on both teams really wanted to win. They took pride in being the dominant league. Starters wanted to play the whole game, not get a couple at-bats and come out.

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The AL dominated the All-Star Game in the early years, winning 12 of the first 16 games. Then the NL went on a long run from 1950 to 1987 during which they won 33 of 42 games (with one tie), including 19 of 20 from 1963 to 1982. Since the late 80s, the AL has won 22 of 29, with the one tie in 2002.

Somewhere along the way winning the game took a backseat to getting everyone some playing time. This ultimately resulted in the 2002 tie game. Making the game “count” was supposed to solve this problem and it seemed to make a difference early on.

In the 2002 game that ended in a tie, there were two starting players who had at least three plate appearances. In each of the next two years after the tie game, there were nine starters who had at least three plate appearances. Managers were keeping their guys in the game longer than they had in 2002. Then, gradually, the number of starters getting three plate appearances trended down. Last year, five starters had at least three plate appearances. Now that we’ve reverted back toward the “everyone gets to play” theme, it’s past time to stop awarding home field advantage to the league that wins the All-Star Game.

As much as baseball traditionalists may yearn for the past when the AL and NL were distinct leagues that played to win the All-Star Game, those days are gone. There is interleague play all season long now. Also, with the money the owners are making and the salaries the players are earning, it’s too big a risk to have an All-Star pitcher throw more than an inning or two. There’s too much money in the game for it to go back to the days of Pete Rose bowling over Ray Fosse at the plate to win an All-Star Game (which wouldn’t be allowed these days anyway because of the rules that protect the catcher).

This year’s game does come with an added incentive for the All-Stars, but it won’t be a big incentive for some. Players on the winning team will receive $20,000 each and the losers get nothing. That’s a good chunk of cash to many fans but for a guy like Clayton Kershaw, who is making $33 million this year, $20,000 is the equivalent of $30 to a person making $50,000 a year.

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Baseball fans don’t need the game All-Star Game to “count.” This year’s All-Star Game won’t determine which league will host the World Series, but it’s a chance to see the best players in one league against the best in the other on a Tuesday evening in July. We could see a lefty-versus-lefty matchup of Chris Sale against Bryce Harper. Or see if Aaron Judge can handle the heat of Max Scherzer. That’s what the game is all about, not an arbitrary awarding of home field advantage to the winning league.

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