All-Star Game Implications Still Debated
Dan Mohrmann
The Major League Baseball Players Association and the owners have yet to decide if this years All-Star Game will determine home field advantage in the World Series.
After the 2002 tied All-Star Game in Milwaukee, MLB Commissioner Bud Selig proposed that the winner of the next All-Star Game would earn home field advantage for its league in the World Series. The players’ union and the owners initially struck a two year, which was extended for one more. Now the deal is not in place and there has not been a vote on whether or not to renew it.
Selig’s proposal seemed to be on the right track. The fans were livid with a tied summer classic so naturally the answer was to put some kind of incentive on the game. Home field advantage was touchy stipulation amongst the fans. Yankee fans became livid that someone from Tampa Bay could have a stake in whether or not the Bronx Bombers would have the upper hand in the fall classic.
Baseball had previously followed the format of the Super Bowl, where teams would alternate being the home team every other year. In football, that philosophy works out because the Super Bowl is typically held at a neutral site. Baseball remains the only sport where the dimensions of every field or court are different in every stadium.
The most logical plan should be to scrap home field advantage being won in the All-Star Game. Let the best team in the World Series get because they earned it through better play. The All-Star game is a fun event for the players and the fans and some of that fun gets drained with an added stipulation. If Bud Selig doesn’t want the game to end in a tie, allow each manager to select three reserve pitchers so that if the game goes into extra innings it doesn’t have to be cut short.
Basketball and hockey both give home court advantage to the best team, and the only difference in those sports is that the fans are in your favor. With baseball, a team is used to playing in its own ballpark, which is different than anywhere else in baseball. Home field advantage is more important in baseball than any other sport in America.
If it can’t be earned through the season then there is no reason for teams to play competitive baseball once they earn a playoff spot. If the best team plays at home, tight races will be fun to watch at the end of the year. Teams won’t call up half of their Triple A team in order to keep their stars healthy. That’s something that happens in football. Baseball is America’s pastime; it’s about time that it shows that America is about competition and being the best at whatever it can.
The first step to showing that the best get rewarded is to throw out the home field stipulation in the All-Star Game. Let the game be fun for every one. Let the playoffs be determined through the regular season.