Yankees Chick - News, Rumors, and Opinions on the Bronx Bombers From a Brunette Babe

There are many aspects of this crazy little game that drive the Yankees Chick batty (not that I am one to complain, no sir!), from people's insistence on using the useless win stat to the lack of effective drug policies, and the All-Star game also has a home on my i-dont-like-you-one-bit list. Every July our near-daily dose of important baseball is rudely interrupted by a near-meaningless (save for the lamentable fact that home field advantage for the World Series is dependent on the outcome of the game; fear not, we will be returning to this matter in a moment) game surrounded by 2 off-days, and the problems with this affair are many. I realize that some folks enjoy the 3-day reprieve from the usual grind and get a kick out of watching players from different teams join together for a game, but I find the whole operation to be frustrating and even quite worrisome. Let’s examine:

The threat of injuries alone is enough to make me wary. Yes, each player generally only stays in the game for a couple innings, but all it takes is one sharp drive back to the pitcher (see Rasner, Karstens) or an accidental collision (see Mientkicantspellhisname) to put a player right out of commission. Since the game features the top players of the game, the damage an injury would do to a team is greatly intensified. Imagine if Jeter or A-Rod were to get smacked in the face by a wayward pitch…
Home field advantage during the World Series is much too crucial a matter to be determined by a game that is not taken seriously by most players – many of the participants already know that the post-season is not in their future and thus have no real incentive to ensure their league wins the game, and the threat of injuries keeps most if not all players from going all out. The AL has a clear advantage, winning 15 of the last 20 All-Star games (2002 ended in a tie; no it was not a hockey game), and that surely isn’t fair for the NL World Series team.
Taking 3 days off could be detrimental to a team that needs to be rallying for a post-season race, such as the Yankees this year. The only way they are going to have a shot at October is if they buckle down, focus, and start consistently winning 5+ in a row. The last thing this team needs is to get out of the groove - they’re still not even in their groove.
The idea of an All-Star game is to showcase the league’s best players, but the rosters do not reflect that. Fan voting turned the selection process into a popularity contest, putting the most exciting or well-known players ahead of lesser-known or small-market folks. Also, since the rosters much feature at least one representative from each MLB team, some talented players do not make the cut simply because there is no room.

That said, congratulations to Jeet, A-Rod, and Jorgie, who will be representing the Yanks in the game this year. A-Rod may decide to sit out and take the 3-day break to rest his strained hammy (a much wiser use of the break than playing in the game, if you ask me), but I’m sure it was a nice feeling for him to come out on top of the voting. I’ll be watching, of course, but throughout the entire game I will be thinking “I sure do wish I was watching an actual game right now and not a bunch of dudes that don't know or like each other half-assing their way through 9 innings of baseball.”