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The time has come once again for me to give my yearly "Bud Selig sucks for screwing up the MLB All Star Game" post here at the Gab. Well, I may or may not have actually written this post in years past, but it seems like I complain about this atrocity of a game every year because it just keeps getting worse and worse since Bud has decided since the dreaded tie of 2002 that "this game counts".
Look Bud, I understand that the tied All Star Game embarrassed you, but that's no reason to ruin it for everyone else. It's an All Star Game. It's supposed to be an exhibition for the fans to enjoy. I mean, if the game were really supposed to count for home field advantage during the World Series, shouldn't the managers for each league be able to manage the game like it actually means something? You can't have it both ways Bud. Either make the game an exhibition like it's supposed to be and keep the status quo in regards to how the rosters are selected, or make the game count for home field advantage in the World Series and let the managers put the best players on the team and eliminate the "every team must be represented" requirement.
Also, let's get rid of the "every player must play an inning" crap. It's the Major Leagues, not little league. These guys aren't going to cry themselves to sleep at night if they don't get an at-bat. (Well, actually some of them might, but that's another story for another day.) At the end of the day they want to win, because they want home field advantage for their league in the slim chance their team actually makes it to the World Series. (Well, except for the guys on the Royals, Astros, Cubs, etc. - they know they don't stand a chance.)
There's no problem with the All Stars wanting to win. They're baseball players, so of course they're going to be competitive no matter what they're doing. That's the nature of being an athelete. But, there's a problem when they can't be half-assed during an exhibition game because it means something that's only relevant to about 15% of the players on both rosters. It's a shame that home field advantage in the World Series can come down to a showdown in the bottom of the 9th inning between the Cubs' representative and the Royals' representative. That's the kind of stuff that players from the Yankees, Nationals, Reds, Braves, Diamondbacks, Dodgers, Giants, Tigers, and Rangers players should decide. They're the ones who will potentially be effected by the outcome, so they should be the ones who determine what happens.
But that kind of stuff can't really be controlled. Baseball is great like that. There's no telling what's going to happen until it does. There's no schedule other than the lineups that are presented at the beginning of the game, and with the All Star game that lineup goes through more changes than Kim Kardashain does penises. That's the beauty of baseball. We can't really predict what's going to happen. We can only make educated guesses based on the constantly changing information we're given. An All Star Game shouldn't be concerned with who's coming up to bat in the bottom of the 8th inning, and it shouldn't matter which pitcher should warm up in the bullpen. It should just be a game of baseball between each league's best players. It should be simple. It should be for the fans.
The All Star Game should go back to being the fun exhibition game it used to be, where both teams are trying to win but they're not treating it like it's Game 7 of the World Series. The fans of the game should be treated to a spectacle that showcases the game's best doing what they love - playing the game of baseball with nothing on the line other than their pride that they were able to win the game. I know that Bud will never change because he's the only person on the planet that thinks "this one counts" is a good idea, but it's about time that he comes back to reality and learns that in order to save the All Star Game, he has to return it to its roots. He has to let it get back to being about the fans, instead of being about something that it was never intended to be about.
He needs to make the game about the fans, or he needs to make it about baseball and take the fans out of it completly. Either way is fine in the end, but trying to play to both sides is making the game a total sham, and baseball fans don't deserve a sham. We deserve a product that we can get behind, and unfortunately as long as Bud Selig is in charge I don't believe we'll ever see that. But, I can always hope.
As much as I hate that it can't be what it used to be, I know that I'll still be watching. I just can't help myself - I love the game too much to give up watching it. Perhaps Bud knows that, and he's using that knowledge to further his agenda, knowing that to the true baseball fans it won't matter what he does because he knows we'll still tune in to watch. I'm positive he knows that, and the fact that he knows and still makes a sham of the All Star Game makes him an even bigger son of a bitch than I give him credit for.
And that's saying an awful lot.
Until next Monday...
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