Now, I don’t want to get off on a rant here… but I still can’t figure out why if Pete Rose admits to doing the very thing that got him banned from baseball for life, he will likely be reinstated. If Bud Selig won’t stand up and say "Betting on baseball is completely unacceptable and the penalty is a lifetime ban – PERIOD.", then baseball needs to find someone who will.
Don’t even get me started on the whole "All-Star game winner gets home field advantage in the world series" mess. The reason people don’t care as much about the All-Star game is simple: interleague play.
And while we’re at it, get rid of the damn wildcard so we get our pennant races back!
And can we get the Expos in a real market with real owners sometime soon?
I was pleased to read this Jayson Stark column.
Selig is bad for baseball, period.
I can think of a couple of other reasons for the lack of interest in the All-Star Game: the spoils system, by which the managers pad their benches with players from their own teams that nobody wants to see, and the idea that getting everyone into the game is more important than winning. That was what ruined last year’s game–both teams emptied their benches too early.
But Selig thinks he can fix this problem by tweaking something else. C’mon.
The baseball owners wanted a yes-man, and that’s what they got in Selig. But by the very design of the office, that’s bad for baseball.
I agree with you on most of your points. However I still the the root of the problem with the all-star game stars with inter-league play. Until then, the game was much more of a pride and competition thing with the players. Now (as you mention) it is just treated as an exibition by the players and managers alike.