All Star Break or The Longest 5 Days of the Year

I hate this time of the year. Pennant races are heating up, player slow starts are a thing of the past and the trade deadline looms. Then right in the middle of all this excitement, baseball takes 5 days off for a couple of exhibitions and a contest. These are the longest 5 days of my life.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I like the All Star Game. It meant more to me as a kid because you got to see players from the other league that you might never see. However now with interleague baseball, that shine is gone. It messes up the flow of the season. They play a futures game, with minor league prospects, which has potential but has not caught my interest yet. The home-run hitting contest had a chance but is ruined by two things. It is too long with little action and Chris Berman (ESPN) announces it. If I hear “back, back, back, gone” one more time I will puke. I am willing to entertain any and all suggestions on how to improve the homer contest. By the way, how could MLB put Robbie Cano in a position to be booed during his entire at bat? The obvious solution would be an automatic berth for the hometown hitter most deserving of being in the home run derby.

The game itself, boring I’m afraid. This whole “now the game counts” is ridiculous. Give the home field to the league champion who has the better record, if they tie then maybe go to interleague play or play against their divisional rivals. The thought that an All Star game decides home field is the equivalent of a shootout deciding the soccer World Cup Champion. Nope, dumb ideas, both.

Is it Friday yet?

PINCH HITS

I thought I would mention a few All Star moments that stick in my mind…

- Fenway Park, 1999 - in the first round, Mark McGwire hit a 488-foot shot beyond the Green Monster clearing the street, soared over a parking garage and hit a billboard above the train tracks, right next to the never-reached Massachusetts Turnpike. BusinessBoy and I watched in amazement and yelled louder than the fans present

-2002 Twins center fielder Torii Hunter made an incredible catch to rob single-season home run champ Barry Bonds of a homer in the bottom of the first inning. I had turned on the TV just in time to see this catch

-The 2002 MLB All-Star Game resulted in a 7-7 tie after 11 innings, and both teams had run out of players and pitchers. I chanted Bud Selig must go from then on.

-1983, Comiskey Park highlighted by the only grand-slam home run in the history of the All-Star Game, hit by California Angels center fielder Fred Lynn. When we played ball at home, my brother was always Lynn because of his glove. This made it even better.

-1993, John Kruk had an at-bat against Randy Johnson of the Seattle Mariners and Kruk reacted like all of us would have facing a 6'10" pitcher throwing 99 miles an hour. I remember some people feeling that Kruk made a farce of the game. I figured he was just scared shitless.

-1989 game when  Bo Jackson took a Rick Reuschel pitch and deposited it 448 feet away for a mammoth home run. I can still hear the bat hit that ball, very, very cool.

-1971 Reggie Jackson came to bat as a pinch-hitter for Oakland A’s starter Vida Blue and hit it on the roof of Tigers Stadium into a light tower estimated at 520 feet. I missed this one live but remember seeing a replay somewhere else later on and just marveling at how far that ball went.

-1999 MLB Boston Red Sox pitcher Pedro Martinez struck out 5 of the six men he faced with the other being thrown out stealing on K number 5. I hated the Red Sox then, hate them now but realize just what kind of history was being made here.

-Yankee Stadium, 2008 Josh Hamilton hit 28 home runs in one round of the home run derby, each one seeming longer than the last. Again, a mesmerizing performance even if he didn’t win the derby.

See you in a few days!

WTF is wrong with this picture Bud?

MEMORANDUM

To: Mr. Bud Selig
Subject: WTF?
From: T Fab P and baseball fans everywhere

It may seem that I only write to you when you make a mistake, which is like once or twice a week now-a-days. Remember when I told you back in June 2010 how to handle that no hitter/not no hitter when umpire, Jim Joyce, made that mistake that cost Armando Galarraga a chance at no hitter immortality? I laid it all out for you so you could have been the hero of the situation, but did you listen? No. I wrote to you again this past June, about the rumors of realignment and changes in the baseball playoffs. I gave you a detailed plan, centered on what the fans want, what we really need. Did you listen then? No. So when I heard about this newest debacle related to uniforms and commemorating September 11th, I harbored no fantasy or expectation that you would actually listen because this is all about the money for you and the owners. But I will tell you anyway and hope you will do the right thing. Do I suspect you will listen? No. But here it is anyway.

When baseball resumed playing after the September 11th tragedy, both the Yankees and Mets, our New York teams, honored the bravest and finest, by wearing caps that saluted the 343 policemen and firemen and EMT’s and paramedics who gave their lives that day as well as the hundreds more who were first responders. This was a stirring tribute, one that to this day, still brings a tear to my eye. They honored them and they deserved every moment of remembrance that this brought.

So imagine how I felt, how the fans of baseball felt, when we heard that the Yankee and Met players were planning to wear those caps again, on the 10th anniversary of that tragedy, in memory. What a wonderful and fitting tribute, devoid of any reason other than altruism, one to be embraced, and respected and honored.

So did MLB do the right thing here? Did they grab this wonderful notion and hold it up for the entire world to see? Oh, come on now, you know the answer as well as I do. No, they did not. They banned the wearing of those caps. They threatened to fine any players significantly if they ignored the ban. Was the reasoning pure? Oh, come on now, you know the answer to that too. Baseball with you, former owner and current commissioner, was going to honor your favorite thing in all the world - money. You butchered this one up real good. Just like you have infringed in all matters of patriotism with your MLB "official caps" on the 4th of July or Memorial Day, you have produced the “OFFICIAL” September 11th baseball cap, complete with American Flag on the back, that we the fan, will have the opportunity to purchase for a mere $36.99. Yes, you said no to the memory, yes to the money and produced a cap that would be worn on only “one day” in order to make a killing on the deaths and sacrifices of these true heroes.

Well you know what Buddy Boy, you can take your patriotic clap trap and shove it up your and MLB’s ass. I wouldn’t want one of your caps if you gave them away for free. If I got my way, this will be the spark of an event that leads to you resigning in disgrace. This was unconscionable. This was bad PR, this was greedy and self important. This was a mistake.

You sir, are an idiot…