Proposing an All-Star Overhaul
MLB’s 86th All-Star Game is just over a month away, and if you’ve been paying attention to the early voting, you know you can actually skip the event and just watch any random Kansas City Royals game instead; it will basically be the same thing. The Royals have turned out their voting bloc in droves, and unless the other franchises make a late move, the American League is going to try and bunt, steal, and defend their way to a 1-0 win in Cincinnati next month.
Just as the game itself is an annual tradition, so too are summer columns suggesting ways to “fix” or “improve” the Midsummer Classic. Even Jonah Keri, an absurd optimist who probably has Everything Is Awesome as the only song in his Spotify playlist, hates the current All-Star format:
Jonah Keri: I’m the most positive guy you’ll ever meet. Also, I love baseball. Adore it. Bathe myself in it.
But All-Star week — the Home Run Derby, the actual All-Star Game, and especially the four days with no real baseball — are freaking terrible. Uh-oh. Here comes Angry Jonah.
Why the hell does this game “count”? It’s a total farce. AL All-Star manager John Farrell has already said he won’t use any pitcher for more than one inning under any circumstances. How is that managing to win? Why should that count?
I’m with Jonah. All-Star Week sucks. The Futures Game is fun and worth doing, but the rest of it doesn’t interest me at all. And MLB’s attempt to make the game “count” is silly, and has done nothing to change the fact that this is still an exhibition game designed solely to make a lot of money for the league. But I also recognize that it’s good for MLB to market itself on a large stage, giving people a mid-season event to turn into, especially where the game’s best players are all assembled together. But the All-Star Game isn’t really a baseball game, and it doesn’t show off what is good about the sport.
So I’d like to make a proposal to overhaul the All-Star Week. This idea still allows MLB to gather its best players in one location — in fact, even expands the number of players who get to participate — while also giving us three actual baseball games, with actual baseball rosters, played under normal baseball conditions. The concept? Battle of the Ages.
Instead of bloated American League and National League rosters, MLB would create four teams of 25 players, bucketed by age-brackets: 18-24, 25-29, 30-34, and 35+. You’d have a team of the best of MLB’s young stars, big name former superstars who are still hanging around the league, and two teams loaded with in-their-prime studs. You’d get 100 players at the event, so every team would naturally be represented, and every fan base would be able to tune in to watch their best players perform on the big stage.
With four teams, you run a very simple three game tournament:
Monday, 1 pm: 31-34 vs 35+
Monday, 7 pm: 18-24 vs 25-29
Tuesday, 8 pm: G1 winner vs G2 winner
You let the 20 year olds and 30 year olds battle it out with a Monday double header, and then the two winners advance to play the Battle of the Ages on Tuesday night. And because you’re playing two real games without the need to get everyone a token appearance, you can build out actual 25 man rosters that reflect what a regular season baseball team looks like. Each team would select three starting pitchers — one to start each potential game, plus a long guy in case a game goes extra innings — and seven relievers, then have a six man bench behind their starters. And because you’d potentially be playing games on back to back days, bullpens would be filled with actual relievers, rather than converted starters whose arms have been conditioned to rest between appearances.
What would these teams look like? I’m glad you asked, because I spent all morning building our four hypothetical teams based on these rules. On to the rosters.
As you’d expect, the 25-29 and 30-34 teams are absolutely stacked, and would be the odds-on favorites to meet in the Tuesday night game each year, but the 18-24 group has a lot of interesting talent as well. The 35+ group is a little rough around the edges, but at least they have name value, and it gives you a chance to let the casual fans still see the guys they’ve heard of, rather than leaving them at home.
I will note that there’s one glaring downside to this proposal; you end up with most of the best starting pitchers in baseball sitting at home watching. The 25-29 group is, in particular, insanely loaded, so there’s no Felix Hernandez, David Price, Corey Kluber, or Matt Harvey, among other aces who you could easily slot in to one of those three spots. But I’d argue that while these guys are obviously deserving of recognition for their accomplishments, they generally only get three outs in the All-Star Game anyway, so I don’t know that we’d lose that much by not having them participate, relative to the current structure.
It’s a flaw in the idea, certainly, but maybe not the kind of flaw that invalidates the entire concept. Maybe you guys will feel differently, but I’d take three baseball games that are played like baseball games over token relief appearances from starters just getting their three outs and going home.
But I think the rest of it could be pretty great. Let both the young and old guys try to dethrone teams that are basically your normal All-Star rosters — okay, with a Justin Turner here or there occasionally — and have the victors of the first two games meet on the big stage. Instead of one pretty lame baseball-type game, we get three contests that actually resemble the sport we all like, and a mini-tournament is far more exciting than an interminably long home run derby and a celebrity softball game no one cares about.
Of course it’s too crazy to ever actually happen, but I’d sign up to watch this in a heartbeat. It’d be an All-Star Week for people who actually like baseball. Sign me up.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
Have the 18-24 year olds play the 35+ in the first round. That would be fun. Then you have the presumably two best teams, 25-29 and 30-34 play in the first round. The favorites play a really young team or really old team in the final.
And to make it count, each player of the winning age group gets to start with an 0-1 (pitchers) or 1-0 (batters) count in the World Series…
That’s not very ideal. The chances are the 25~29 vs 30~34 game is going to be the highlight of the whole thing anyway. Give both the young team and the old team a chance to beat out the 25~34 team.
Maybe it is just me, but 18 to 24 looks like a sleeper right now. Trout, Harper, Pederson, Bryant, Arenado, Puig, Cole….not as good as 25-30, but a lot of exciting talent.
I was skeptical of this idea at first thought, but I am now in love with the concept. A three game tourney would be epic, the build up to it would be fun and it would be real, competitive baseball.
I love it.
Yes the middle groups will be the best quality of play, so we would guarantee they would play and get the highest quality game. Also, the 24 and under vs. the 35 and older would be great in a kind of old era vs. new era or father son kind of way. The point is to watch all 3 games and not just the “championship” game, and either way, the best team will win, not that winning actually counts for anything.
I didn’t really like the All-Star game and all-star week until I realized that it wasn’t for me (the die hard baseball fan who buys mlb.tv etc) it’s for my 6 year old who thinks the homerun derby is really cool and other casual fans and younger people like him. If the home run derby for example was really great, we would have that instead of regular baseball. It’s a diversion for certain fans, it’s fun. That’s it.
Shouldn’t MLB try to reward the die hard fans? Instead they’re trying to rake in more money by making the allstar game a side-show
The die hard fans who love the games every other day of the season don’t need a reward in the middle of it. The whole year is the reward.
MLB already has you die hards, same way the NFL ignores it’s die hards when it comes to the Superbowl half – time show. It’s about attracting new fans. Die-hards are gonna keep watching regardless.
I think this is a fantastic idea.
The omission of Paul Goldschmidt ruins the entire premise of your post. Inexcusable
So does the fact that Paul Goldschmidt wasn’t omitted validate the entire premise? Just curious.
DH, 25-29
He’s the DH for the 25-29 team
Your inability to read ruins the entire premise of your post. Inexcusable.
CTRL-F. Learn it. Love it. Live it.
25-29 DH
Do the fans still vote, just for four teams instead of two? The voting is as much a part of it as the game, so if it checks that box I don’t see why not, other than that two games for people slightly increases the impact on their actual team….
Love this idea, never will happen, but it would be fun.
Never say never….I am thinking about making these rosters in MLB The Show lol
HA! I basically fantasy drafted that 18-24 year old team in my Franchise mode. We are awesome.
I love it… but I’d prob love any halfway reasonable alternative to the nonsense we have to currently endure. I absolutely detest the current set up.
My ideas for revamping the AS break have ranged from a US vs. int’l game to scrapping the game in mid-season and replacing it with a Pro Bowl style game to cap the season a week after the World Series concludes. But there’s no doubt they have to do something.
Thought for a second there you’d said “replace it with a Pro Bowlers style game.” Had a vision of Kershaw and Scherzer throwing different kinds of strikes, and maybe clips from The Big Lebowski playing between frames.
Might still be more interesting than the actual All-Star game …
Someone last year suggested a post-world series slow pitch softball game. You still get to honor the all-stars, but you can vote based on the entire season and you aren’t using pitchers at a time when their teams need them and you aren’t pretending it’s real baseball.
I second the idea.
Is there any evidence that fans dislike the All Star Game? Stats-based writers (I’m sorry, I can’t think of a better term) have been complaining about it for so long that there’s no point in paying attention. You are not the only people who “actually like baseball.”
I like that it counts. I couldn’t watch it during the years when opponents could bearhug each other during the game, on the field. And “it counts” very little: How often has there even been a Game 7 of the World Series? But at least the players can’t openly dog it like they had been for years.
I am a fan and I dislike the All Star game and I am not a stats-based writer. That’s evidence.
Hurray! Sample size of 1. You have clearly proven your point in your universe.
I am a fan and I dislike the All Star game and I am not a stats-based writer. That’s also evidence.
Perhaps I can introduce you two to a common term on this site: “Small Sample Size.”
But if you actually ARE the center of the Earth, I genuflect.
I am a fan and I like the All Star game and I am a stats-based reader. Can I be evidence, too?
No, you are an aberration
It depends on what you’re classifying as a “fan”. I don’t personally know anybody who enjoys the all-star game or thinks it’s fun. Like someone mentioned earlier, it’s mainly aimed at young kids, which I guess is fine.
As for how much it counts? Home-field can make a huge difference, especially in the 2-3-2 format MLB uses. I know it’s to save travel time and schedule time, but man I really hate the 2-3-2.
2-3-2 is the worst! Hockey uses 2-2-1-1-1 and those playoffs necessarily match up an east team and a west team. Baseball needs to change it.
Why is 2-3-2 so bad? Is it because the other team has home field through the first 5 games and thus has a better shot of closing out a series with the advantaged team just getting two home games?
Yup.
I’m not sure that really matters much though. Especially in the face of all the off days required for the 2-2-1-1-1 schedule. I mean, think about the rotation and bullpen implications of going to 4 off days out over 7 games. The current 2 off days over 7 games is already a pretty big distortion relative to the regular season which is more like 1 out of 10 games or more.
“Is it because the other team has home field through the first 5 games and thus has a better shot of closing out a series with the advantaged team just getting two home games?”
I don’t get this. No matter how you order the games, the away team has to win one more game on the road than the home team.
The scenario where the away team goes 3-2 in the first five is unlikely, and even if it happens, it means that they did their job in the first five games. If the home team can’t steal a game in the first five, and can’t win the must-win games at home, then they squandered their advantage.
I don’t think there is much evidence fans don’t like the all-star game, no. If you look at the World Series ratings and the All-star game ratings over time, the trend is nearly identical. The world series ratings are higher, but the decreasing slope of the regression from both trends is almost exactly parallel (-.48 points/year for the WS, -.47 points/year for the ASG). It would appear that where baseball goes, so follows the all-star game.
Now maybe there is some dependance here (i.e. if the all-star game sucks, less fans are enticed to view the WS or visa versa), but I kinda doubt it. MLB’s all-star game draws about equal viewership as the NFL’s probowl, yet the Super Bowl draws a crazy number of viewers. So I don’t think these exhibition games really have much pull over the sports general popularity.
Evidence, you say? Why yes. It’s right here:
http://www.baseball-almanac.com/asgbox/asgtv.shtml
Not a stat-based writer. And you asked, so I’m just answering. You can snidely dismiss me if you wish — you’ll note you’ve also provided no evidence, and are now a smaller sample size than those responding to your question.
The All Star Game is the low point of the season for me.
Cancel it overall gets my vote, and just give the players a few days of vacation, all of the players…..but we know that isn’t happening.
I have no issue with the skills competition either way, but the game counting is bad, very bad, imo.
Frankly, I’m not the target audience, I don’t watch any ASG stuff for any sport. Not worth my time.
I feel the same way. I consider the all star break an opportunity for me to get outside and forget about baseball for a few days. My life is richer for it.
Cancel it? Really?
You are depressing.
Wait, what incentives the teams to play these like regular baseball games? They’re still just exhibitions and no team would ever allow their pitchers to throw numerous innings.
Exactly this. There’s a reason that Farrell won’t pitch any pitcher more than an inning and that’s because none of the teams that send a pitcher actually wants them to pitch in a meaningless (from the team’s POV) game. There’s no upside for the team and only downside in at the very least the pitcher puts unnecessary pitches on the arm. The worst thing that can happen is that the pitcher sustains an injury.
The one even bigger problem I see here is that no one, neither fans nor team personnel, want to see their pitchers used like this in an exhibition tournament in the middle of the season. I know I, as a Pirate fan, don’t want to see Gerrit Cole throw seven innings in an exhibition in July, and I’d imagine Neal Huntington, Clint Hurdle, and ray Searage feel the same. There’s a pretty valid reason for having pitchers only work one inning each in the All-Star game.
Not that I care about or like the All-Star game, mind you. I wouldn’t mind overhauling it, but I don’t think this is the way to go.
Wait…..where are the other 6 Royals position players?
Right?
My sense is that Dave Cameron and fangraphs’ types generally know about player’s ages and care about them a lot more than the average fan. Because of that people are going to find the age buckets weird and random.
How about a battle of the divisions? You could have multiple double headers every day with practically every average and above player in a given division playing some of the time.
That would actually be really cool. Good call.
Actually; in my opinion, I think the public and media would be fairly captured by a young-up-and-coming-next-superstars versus a old-man-used-to-be-fantastic-still-love-you-do-you-have-anything-left kind of game.
But you’d probably want to bucket it by service time rather than age. It’s pretty common to know who’s a rookie, less common to know who’s 22 or 25.
I would watch the shit out of this but only if someone broadcasts all interactions between teammates Jose Bautista and Darren O’Day.
Intellectually interesting but not going to happen. Asking MLB teams to give the ASG ~54 innings pitched just won’t work. Trying to get a real start from six different all-star quality SP’s would lead to most of the ones you want to see throwing over the weekend so they wouldn’t have to “waste” a start on this game. The guys available for a Monday “real” start will be the ones teams have set up to skip as they reset their post-ASG rotation.
BTW, a pet peeve. When you say “going to try and bunt…..” you really mean “going to try TO bunt…..” Very common mistake, but mistake nonetheless.
It’s not a mistake. It’s a perfectly valid colloquial expression. This blog post is not exactly written in a highly formal register.
It’s not a valid colloquial expression, it’s typing what you hear rather than what the words are. It’s like saying that typing “I’m gonna vote for Utley for the All-Star game” is a valid colloquial expression because “gonna” is what you hear.
Perfect analogy, since it is another case of the “to” part of an infinitive getting converted into something nonsensical. cass, try expanding around the “and” to put the words connected into actual phrases. It becomes nonsense:
“the American League is going to try and is going to bunt, steal, and defend” ??????? Really, is “trying” part of their strategy to win?
As opposed to the second “and:”
“the American League is going to bunt, and is going to steal, and is going to defend”
Now I’m going to the Grammar Girl website for more dorky fun!
Easy solution to the snubbed pitchers problem: have them manage these teams. It gets them involved in the festivities while giving viewers the pleasure of seeing inexperienced managers take a swing at it, metaphorically. Also, who wouldn’t love the chance to see a situation where a starter is struggling, and the manager pulls him and inserts himself onto the mound? Considering these games are exhibitional, and thus don’t matter, where’s the harm in having a little fun?
Your proposal is way over-complicated. Democracy is not the problem, it just needs to be done right. Go back to ball-park voting only, so that only people who actually watch the games can vote — that would eliminate a wide swath of nerds who are creating dummy email addresses to stuff the ballot-boxes worse than Kennedy did in ’60.
Or you could go back to having the players vote. Either would be an improvement over the status quo. http://twtwsports.blogspot.com/2015/06/twtws-2015-mlb-all-star-game-ballot.html
I just think there’s too many players that are on the ballot, and the voting opens too early.
Take the top 5 from each position in each league as of June 1 (or maybe a week earlier), with 1 write in available, put them on the ballot and let people vote. Too many players on the ballot too early in the year is just silly.
The fact that MLB allows every player to be voted for after like 25 games into the season is what kills the process and ultimately allows the kind of scenario we are seeing this year.
ballpark-only voting would exclude large buckets of the US population who don’t live close to an MLB team, and naturally biases results towards large-market teams.
It creates a bias towards people who actually watch baseball games, instead of people who know how to work robot email accounts.
It also create a bias towards people who can afford to go to MLB games in major markets, instead of real people.
The nearest MLB park is over 3 hours from my house, and that’s with good traffic in Atlanta (good luck with that). And neither I nor my wife roots for Atlanta, if we want to watch a game it’s a weekend trip to St. Louis.
And I agree, I’d far rather have all park than all internet voting.
Yes, it puts low attendance teams at a disadvantage, but I can live with that.
I think in the past ballots were at minor league parks as well.
You mean all those internet nerds that stuffed the ballot box for the 1957 all star game?
Interesting idea. But if you limit the voting to a more committed group of fans, you can still end up with a situation where the election results are distorted, like when the Supreme Court stole the 2000 election.
STILL butthurt over 2000? Lawd.
how about 9 innings of non-taxing pitcher’s arms with softball tosses, aluminum bats, and your local city’s recycling can for a strike zone? i’d watch this. otherwise, yawn.
The fact that you have Grandal over Salvador Perez is absolutely baffling. Can’t take this article seriously because of this omission. Perez higher average, homeruns, RBI’s, WAR, and don’t even get me started on the defense.
The point of this article was to come up with a way to omit as many Royals as possible.
That outfield of Trout, Harper, and Pederson would be a lot of fun.
what about just 1 vote per e-mail account?
My ideas: Weird one week long single elimination tournament for all teams with the requisite side events (HR Derby, futures game, etc.). Day 1- break for all players, Day 2 takes place in two cities and cuts it down to 15 teams, Day 3- #1 team gets bye, cuts it down to 8 teams. Day 4, Cuts it down to 4 teams, Day 5, Other events, Day 6, Cut down to 2 teams, Day 7, Cut down to the All Star Championship team.
Do you mean actual games or like the teams compete in HR derbies?
I like this idea, but my ideal for the All-Star Game is to make it much less like a regular baseball game, and much more like a true exhibition done for the benefit of the fans.
Why do we watch the All-Stars? It’s because they’re the best at certain skills. I want to see the best players show off their best abilities as much as possible. So let’s build rosters that do that, and along the way get rid of rules that impede it (and which aren’t necessary in an exhibition format). My suggestions:
1. Elect a starting 18. This means the starting lineup is the 9 best hitters(elected regardless of position) and the 9 best defenders (elected by position). Stop forcing the lineup to be a blend between the two – let’s just have two lineups. Let the AL hit against the very best NL defense, and vice versa. This means your NL lineup lets me see Andrelton Simmons start at short (great!), but also lets me see Goldschmidt, Gonzalez, Rizzo, Votto all in the NL lineup (also great!). Use reserves to balance the defensive lineups as needed.
2. Along with #1, allow free substitution throughout. Players can exit and re-enter the game at any time. Why follow formal substitution rules in an exhibition game? If Billy Hamilton’s on the roster, let him pinch run whenever – let him show the skill he’s best at.
3. Fans get to chose specific batting/pitching match-ups. Unlike normal baseball, we should be able to guarantee specific match-ups happen in an exhibition. Mobile voting is advanced enough that MLB could ask fans to vote in real time on who should face Mike Trout in his next AB. You want to see Trout face Chapman? Here’s your chance to vote for it! It’s an exhibition – let the fans manage a bit to let us see what we want!
I like this idea the best
Yeah, make it the best thing it can be, not trying for the best ‘real’ baseball. For the SPs in particular, each game played for real has a significant cost, and there just isn’t the incentive here to make them pay it, unless you make the thing count way too much (5/2 home field in the Series?)
The offense/defense lineups are interesting but if all-around players are penalized I’ll be bummed. Ichiro had better play!
I like the “choose your own matchups”.
I’d like to see skills contests like: pitch for a point target. Hit a 120 mph pitching machine fastball down the pipe. Channel your inner Vlad against a machine painting the corners of a gigantic zone. Bunt to a target.
Yeah there’s no need to try to make it more real. The NBA All-Star Game is basically a run-n-gun alley oop fest where no defense and the teams combine for 300+ points. Same with the NHL where the 2015 All-Star game set the record for most goals scored in an All-Star game. The Pro Bowl is basically aggressive flag football.
Baseball is the only sport to try a ridiculous marketing gimmick like “This one counts” because the ratings for the ASG have been in the shitter for years. I would argue that the ASG would be better served being even LESS real. Make it pure exhibition. That’s why I like Bryan Rodda’s idea above.
Holy crap I love this idea. Fan interaction, great players doing what they’re best at, and sweet matchups.
I love this idea, too, and I want to tweak it to make it even more interesting, and a little less chaotic, by eliminating completely free substitution and instead codifying it.
Each offensive team consists of nine hitters (one from each regular-season position), three platoon hitters, and three pinch-runners. Once a platoon hitter or pinch-runner is used, he is locked into that batting order spot, but there is free substitution between the players occupying it.
Each defensive team consists of twelve defenders, in part because there will be close calls at some positions and in part to match the number of hitters. All starters play at least 5 innings, subs play at least 1.
Each team must include at least three players who fill multiple roles, including one who is both a starting hitter and fielder. (Or maybe that should be four and two — you’d have to start messing around with potential rosters to see which would be better.)
The debates about roster constitution would be tremendous. And in-game strategy would be interesting.
The pitching staffs would be large, with many starters and many relievers, and everyone would be limited to 3 batters faced unless the game went into extra innings. There would be no commercial breaks for most pitching changes, and just three warm-up pitches.
Foe extra innings, you’d designate one SP to pitch once everyone else had been used, and/or each roster could include one or two actual long relievers (guys with IP / G > 1.1).
Not sure about how to figure the best offensive players, but starting the Gold Glove winners from the previous season as the starting 9 on defense would seem fairly reasonable, no?
I just want to see Aroldis Chapman face Javier Baez 27 times.
Yeah, I don’t see teams wanting that many innings. If this were to happen, I’d suggest the “first round” games be simple 5-inning affairs, with the “finals” a 7-inning game. That would help keep the innings down.
Otherwise I think dropping the actual all-star game to 7 innings would make sense. As it is, it starts around 8 eastern and doesn’t finish until after midnight. Limiting it to 7 would at least let it finish a bit earlier, and still gives a chance to see all the stars play. Otherwise, I’d switch the rosters to be a single game, young-stars vs vets. Line up the best 25 and unders against the best of the rest, and then you at least add some extra intrigue.
There’s simply no fixing the all star game, no matter how much we want to fantasize.
As was said, no one wants to risk injury mid season on a meaningless game/games. Think about how many players dont even do the home run derby for fear of how it will impact them for the second half. The game is even worse when we go the 6th and 7th backup to fill in for a guy who wont play for some reason or another. On top of that, think of how many skip out on the WBC for the same reason, as I think they should. You’re getting paid to play for your team, not your league, age bracket or country of origin.
If playing for home field in a potential game 7 isnt enough, nothing will be. In the old days, the winning team’s bonus was more than enough to get guys to go all out. Unless your giving out 8 figures per player, it would be impossible to get the same effect today.
Lets just leave it as it is and enjoy it for what it is. Or, eliminate it altogether, and shift focus to the futures game where there will be no MLB competition to take away focus on an event that will highlight the best future stars on a national stage. It’ll be covered more extensively since its the only baseball for 4 days. Those guys are making a name for themselves, so they will have plenty to play for. Plus whatever bonus money they do get will act as more of incentive to most.
The 35+ team should not be at this event. Instead, after selecting the pool of worthy stars regardless of age, you can then split it by age or league or drafting teams or whatever. Although, caveat, I don’t really see how to guarantee that the best players are going in the proposal, nor am I aware of a way to fix this.
Decent idea, but I don’t think the age groups are necessary. Why not just four teams, drafted fantasy-style? Doesn’t football do it that way now?
We could even keep the fan vote. The top three (or nine, for OF) at each position in the fan vote could be guaranteed a spot on one of the four teams, with the fourth a wild card in case the fans can’t figure out how to pick the best player.
Interesting that the best record in the AL gets all of two players on those four rosters.. The best teams should get the perks and rewards. I like the current system. I hope the Royals have nine or ten All-Stars.
Total Population of Kansas City, MO: 459,787
# of votes received by Alex freakin Rios: 2,311,122
There is no emoticon yet developed for the emotion stirred by these facts.
I think any of the laughter emoticons fit the bill perfectly.
Fans get to vote a total of 35 times so 459,787*35 = 16,092,545. Plus I think KC is getting a lot of support from Missouri and Saint Louis.
35 is such an odd number to settle on, no?
“We really need to let fans vote more than 30 times apiece, otherwise they’ll feel like they have no voice at all!”
“How about 40 boss?”
“GOOD LORD NO. That would ruin the integrity of this thing! Rabble rabble rabble.”
My idea for the all-star game? It might be dangerous but it would sure be a lot more fun than what we have now:
http://www.fangraphs.com/not/dangerous-experiment-a-roster-of-25-adam-dunns/
Of course you can’t clone in real life, so the teams would basically just be like a three-true-outcomes team, an elite speed and defense team, a team of all SP and all RP, etc… And absolutely are hitters pitching, and pitchers hitting/fielding. I would pay real, green, American dollars to see this played out.
The Royals fans get to imagine their team with Mike Trout. Basically the Royals but 8 games better.
The Royals fans get to imagine their team with Mike Trout. Basically the Royals but 8 games better.
Well, the real issue is that no team wants their ace wasting innings on a game that doesn’t benefit them. This doesn’t change that, in fact in makes it worse since you’d now need Kershaw et al to pitch significant innings when they could be resting their arms. The current format allows them to treat the ASG as pretty much a bullpen side session, since the outcomes don’t really matter. No coach will ever pitch a guy a pitch more than the team he belongs to allows.
How’s this for an alternative: Build the hitting rosters the regular way, but fill the pitchers with guys from the minors, who would benefit from pitching against major league talent. This removes the injury risk for the ML pitchers and also has the added benefit of boosting offense for the ASG. It also affords the opportunity for more young pitchers to be showcased and potentially increase their buzz when they get called up.
I think you and a lot of others on here are trying to look at this from a heavy baseball fan/fangraphs/prospect tracker point of view. The problem with that is that most people who will be watching the all star game really don’t care about top pitching prospects. The whole point of the All Star game is to bring in the largest audience as possible in order for baseball to garner as much revenue as possible, and you are not going to get as large of an audience with Julio Urias starting as you would with Clayton Kershaw starting. (Even if he only pitches one inning)
Honestly I think the All Star game doesn’t need a major overhaul. I would just make the following changes
1)Don’t make it count for HFA in the World Series.
2)The Fan Voting only partially counts. It’s good for business to have fan involvement, but I would say that the fans get to nominate the top 3 at each position. The managers/coaches get to choose among the players nominated by the fans.
Turrible to think people get paid to write these articles.
I liked the idea right away. But then I saw the rosters and thought there were too many names missing, despite having 4 teams. You mention it up front as a flaw, but I happen to think it’s a much bigger flaw than you do.
Does a Mets fan really want to watch Cuddyer, but not Harvey or deGrom? Does a Yankees fan want to watch Beltran, but not Pineda? Does any fan want to watch Keone Kela throw an inning, but not Felix Hernandez?
When it comes to rosters, I think you’d need to increase the number of SPs on each team and decrease the number of RPs. Part of your rationale is “they generally only get three outs in the All-Star Game anyway, so I don’t know that we’d lose that much by not having them participate, relative to the current structure.” One of the best parts of the game is watching someone like Verlander (when he was elite) throw an inning against an elite lineup.
Overall I do like the idea, but not if it means we have 28 relievers and 12 starters.
I agree. My biggest issue is the number of relievers across the rosters. Besides, if it’s on the same schedule as the current format, you can just have some starters pitch only one inning, or 5 like Madison Bumgarner 😀
The KC voting takes any last bit of shine off the game. Who wants to watch a game of KC versus the NL, other than KC fans? I can’t imagine a worse all-star game.
It used to be that this was a way to see the best talent in the other league, with the World Series being the only other time the two leagues played each other. With interleague play and all the TV and highlights, this is no longer the case. With the internet, anyone can follow any team.
I’d like to see he voting go to the players, maybe with some add-ons for fans to vote for, in a short voting window. With the players voting for all-stars, at least it would be more of a true all-star team event.
I might even watch an all-star game that had the best players from each league. And it shouldn’t count for anything except bragging rights.
I think this is an indictment on the bandwagon, fair weather Kansas City fans. Their teams were in such a muck for decades that they don’t understand how the balloting is supposed to work.
Eliminate the all-star game completely. Play the regular schedule right through what is now the break and use the new found time to turn the wild card from 1-off to best out of 3.
Much more profitable to the league and much more interesting for the fan.
Players need some sort of break. Eliminating the break and having the season just progress through it is not an option.
Good try, but one meaningless game is enough. I’d like to see MLB simply take a three-day break to allow players to rest up for the home stretch. I know the idea has even less chance of passing than Dave’s.
Apparently, out of 100 players, none of them are Astros. So much for the “naturally every team is represented”.
And only 1 from the A’s. I guess Reddick, Vogt and Sunny can’t crack the top-100….yawn….this idea I lame.
Whoops, now I do see Vogt. But sheesh, no Sunny because he happens to just squeak into the 25-30 range and you only picked 3 SPs?
Interesting on paper but why not propose something that at least has a chance of happening. Just seems like the whole concept of a meaningless exhibition game in the middle of the season is flawed. Pitchers that pitched on Sunday can’t really pitch. Managers don’t want their best pitchers to throw too many pitches etc… Only thing that needs changing is the selection process. Otherwise the current system is about as good as it gets unless a major overhaul is made and I would prefer that overhaul to include things like not having the playoffs played in such cold late October/early November weather.
Here’s Tom Tango’s response:
http://tangotiger.com/index.php/site/article/lemon-all-star-game
I think I agree with him. More starters, fewer relievers, lean towards the best players as opposed to restricting yourself to certain age groups. I can see the argument for purposely including more young players though, as the game probably is biased toward older, more established players at the expense of younger, better ones.
Tom Tango is pretty much always right, haha.
Carrying through on Tango’s idea, its not quite that simple though. We can’t just take the top 100 players and then slice them into quarters because we need to fill positions evenly. The top 4 SSs might all be 18-24, but then the top 4 1B might be 30+.
I just don’t like this age thing. If we want some sort of mini-tournament for the ASG break, I’d rather see some sort of draft-like system after voters pick the top 4 players at each position, including backup OF, MIF and C, top maybe 16 starters and 12 bullpen arms. That would give each team 19 roster spots, which is plenty for 2 games.
Yeah, it’s just silly.
Interesting idea. What the MLB and others have been trying to do is have an exhibition game with the best players in the league giving the same effort as if it were a regular season game. It is what it is. You will never be able to simulate the intensity of a regular or post season game. It is almost like a spring training game.
I am really disappointed that people keep trying. The fact that HFA in the world series is riding on the outcome is a joke. It is never going to be right and neither is the Home Run Derby.
That being said, why not start the season with the all-star game. It is really about seeing the players play and at that point the DL is not full of the players you want to see. And that is really the only difference between that and the middle of the season.
I would also like to see more skill contests. And quit trying to script drama in the Home Run Derby. Get the best power hitters out there and let them go at it. Everything else is BS.
Came here to post your exact suggestion. Not only do you get voting based on an entire season’s body of work (start voting on first day of spring training, close it the week before), you get healthy players like you’re citing here. You don’t have the juggling act of holding players out (by playing time or altogether) over concern of affecting a playoff race.
Make it a night game in the last week of Spring Training, timed so that staff aces would be in regular rotation to start the first game of the season. Oh, and have the Home Run Derby during the afternoon that day. ASG can be at the spring training facility of the previous year’s World Series champs.
The main 2 other things I’d add are to strip out the goofy WS home field advantage nonsense, and to take what’d normally be the All-Star Break and instead distribute those extra days off over the course of the season. It would be a chance to break up the insane stretches of 14 to 17 days of games with no days off that most teams have in their schedules.
All that said, kudos to Dave for this article. This has to be the most original suggestion I’ve read about the ASG in a long time.
The only issue with that would be whether players wear their old team or new team hats, like Jeff Samardzija last year.
Fun idea. This is a little off topic, but structuring it like you have would make for some really interesting (or upsetting) salary comparisons.
The most marketable All-Star event is certainly one with 28 RPs and 12 SPs.
“Each team would select three starting pitchers — one to start each potential game”
There are only 2 potential games for any given team.
Keep reading that sentence.
Nice try, but I don’t think this would work very well. I think most starters would opt out of the All-Star game under this format.
Once upon a time the game had some meaning. Before inter league play and local TV markets exploded, the All-Star game was the only time you saw the other leagues stars. Today it has no meaning other than to make money. I won’t support it by watching it. Haven’t seen one is decades and not going to start now.
“Today it has no meaning other than to make money.”
Unlike the rest of MLB.
The “haven’t seen one in decades” line cracks me up.
I too like to comment on articles concerning things I haven’t seen in decades.
Like the Geo Metro and Tiger handheld games.
“I think most starters would opt out of the All-Star game under this format.”
Couldn’t agree more. Deep down I bet most of these guys would rather just accept the All-Star nod and not pitch at all rather than pitch the customary inning or two. I can’t imagine that many of these would be particularly enthused about going five or six innings. Same with the orgs. Is Sandy Alderson going to allow potentially all three of Harvey, deGrom and Syndergaard to pitch a full game during the break when all of them have innings limits?
Seriously..
This is the crap Dave writes about to go along with his terrible predictions and horribly biased “stats”?
What a joke. How does anyone take him seriously?
Simple solution for you…
If you don’t like Dave’s writing, don’t read it.
If you don’t like the ASG, don’t watch it.
There is no point in getting angry over life’s diversions.
You forgot about me.
yup this list is trash
You could even balance-out the competitiveness by narrowing the age range on the stacked teams.
For example you could dake it 18-25, 26-29, 30-33, and 34+. That would push Rizzo, Stanton, and Rosenthal into the young group and push Bautista and Papelbon into the old group.
Remove the fan voting
Remove the fact that it “counts.”
And it’s fixed!
Fan voting is to get people interested in the game, and to promote stars. It’s not going away.
The only problem with this is there’s no Bartolo Colon. Colon by himself makes the game ten times more watchable.
Just select players by WAR – any version. Even if you don’t “believe” in it, you cannot deny that the players who have the highest WAR per position are at least, pretty good.
Let fans decide 1 player per league, not all players.
With the current system, MLB is the only sport that essentially lets the fans decide what team gets home field advantage in the World Series. That is absolutely preposterous.
The ASG is for casual fans, who could not care less about WAR.
Why not add a Senior All-Star game – for retired players who get one last chance in the spotlight. That one wouldn’t even need to be All-Star week
What about me???
“so every team would naturally be represented, and every fan base would be able to tune in to watch their best players perform on the big stage.”
Wow, sounds so much better than the All Star Game! Instead of 1 game that “is still an exhibition game designed solely to make a lot of money for the league”, we get …4 exhibition games? designed to …?
Seriously, what makes a game divided by age groups more exciting than a game divided by league? The only “evidence” provided in the article is that the games would be “actual baseball rosters, played under normal baseball conditions.” No mention whatsoever as to how that would be achieved.
The All Star game in its current format counts for home field advantage in the World Series. This game counts for… bragging rights by age group? And that’s what will make managers change the way they use their pitchers? Did Dave think this plan through at all? It’d be fine if he pitched this idea as something neat that he’d like to see. But to pretend is solves any of the All Star game’s short comings is baffling.
I’m sorry but this is ridiculous and doesn’t seem to have been thought out at all.
You are going to have 100 players travelling and playing with no day off (assuming they are still playing Sunday). And assuming there is a Sunday night game and maybe some West coast games you are going to have a bunch of guys potentially playing a day game after a night game or on short rest, while travelling for kicks?
And the winning teams will be playing back to back games which means you might have some relievers working 3 or 4 days in a row? And then have 1 or 2 days off before the reg season starts up again? Do relievers who have worked 2 or 3 days in a row to end the first half get automatically left off the roster? How does one map this out, as you might not know until Sunday if a reliever has to work – with starters this is known days in advance and replacements can be named. Do you now setup a taxi squad in case some relievers are overworked going into that Monday game?
And since the game is now Monday… any starter pitcher starting Sat or Sun (and possibly Friday?) wouldn’t be able to pitch? Sure they might be eligible to pitch Tues – if the team made it that far. Do you carry them anyway just in case of a Tues game? What happens if the games go extras and it decimates a pitching staff – one long man might not cut it.
This seems like a paper exercise with no thought on the logistics or impact on the players involved.
Before everyone complained the game meant nothing now its for home field advantage in the WS folks still gripe. Let the players and coaches vote only. Keep the fans out of any voting. I like the game the way it is except for 11 and 12 year olds voting 35 times! What’s up with that! As silly as this article.
Just get rid of the ASG. Give the players an offday (no games), and then use the 2-3 days saved to expand the post season. Only reason anyone is even watching the ASG is there are no other games or sports to watch, and its the dog days of TV series on cable, and the sun is setting by the time the game starts in the East
This years AL teams is just such a joke I won’t watch an inning of it in protest. Voting was obviously rigged by someone, somehow for some reason. It was not just the random nonsense we see from fan voting.
I have one problem with your teams. ALTUVE. Actually, I have two problems with your teams. NO ASTROS.
I love your innovative brain, Dave, but you’re proposing to replace one boring exhibition game with three, and that’s not a soulution. Let them remove the World Serie home field advantage as a reward, and play their little game and then we all can move on to the what count, the season. Meanwhile,I will join some 350 million of my fellow Americans that night and do something other than watching that game.
The whole idea of adding home field to the mix was to jazz the ratings. It is a colossal failure so what is the point
This gets an A for entertainment value and a F for practicality.
1) Get rid of “it counts”. No one likes that idea. Give HF advantage to the best record or if it’s necessary to have more planning than NBA/NHL rotate between leagues.
2) CUT the rosters down to 24-27. A starter and reserve at 8 positions, 1 DH in the AL, and 7-9 pitchers. Manager’s discretion but the starters play 5 or 6 and the reserves play the rest or used as PH. Maybe a retiring Jeter plays all 9 innings and an undeserving Royal who’s the 5th best at his position gets pulled after 3 innings.
Top 2 starting pitchers throw 2 innings, leaving 5-7 pitchers for 5 innings.
3) Recognize it’s an exhibition game. The NBA and NHL all-star games are 50-100% higher scoring because no one plays defense; no one seems to care.
OR, do an NFL-style draft for the two teams.
Here’s how I would create four teams for the All-Star Tournament:
Team 1: Selected by the fans’ ballot
Teams 2-4: From the remaining MLB players, have a draft where players are selected by a former player, and old-school writer, and a saber-school writer.
Having a normal game sounds great, but splitting them into age groups just doesn’t make sense to me and seems unnecessary. The AL playing the NL is fine and isn’t the problem. You can have a mini 4 team tournament with 2 teams from each league if you want, but having A.J. Pierzynski and guys that like in a game that is meant to entertain is a waste when you could have better, more exciting and deserving players instead.
But the softball game is the only all star week event I watch…
Royals fans are not coming out in droves Dave, they are running a ballot stuffing episode utilizing sneak google accounts.
http://www.royalsreview.com/2015/6/2/8703771/idiots-guide-to-legal-all-star-ballot-stuffing
Certainly puts those uppity Royals in their places, but I doubt any team is interested in adding three meaningless games in the middle of a long season.
I’m surprised that I’m the first person here to wonder about South Korea’s role in the voting.
The problem with the ASG is not the format. A game between the best players in each league should, in theory, be awesome and well worth watching, and worth playing hard for. The problem is that coaches and players are cautious about injuries for a game that is meaningless. Changing the format of the game doesn’t change this underlying disincentive so I’m not sure what problem it really solves. This would be fun to watch for sure tho.
The Mid-Summer Break should be a 5-day Monday-to-Thursday period where there is one regular season MLB matchup each day and all other teams have the day off.
For pre-season scheduling in 2015, I would have gone:
Monday: Royals @ Giants
Tuesday: Padres @ Dodgers
Wednesday: Mariners @ A’s
Thursday: Yankees at Mets
All other teams have a nice mid-season break.
If you want to see all the stars in a single place at once, bargain with the union to have events in November.
127 comments? You guys know Cameron doesn’t even peek at the comments, right? He never responds. You have a 1 hour weekly chat to correspond with him, and that’s it.
It’s cool, but impractical. No team wants their ace to actually pitch 5+ innings during a midseason exhibition. Not many teams want their stars to play two full meaningless midsummer games, either.
The first injury would kill this concept right quick…
What gets me is that there are actual stakes involved. Take the 2009 World Series. The Philadelphia Phillies entered the playoffs with the best record in baseball and – in any other sport – would have had home field advantage throughout the entire playoffs. I’m not one to believe that home field provides any significant advantage, but over 7 games between an AL & an NL team it can be huge! When the Yankees had home field advantage, Hideki Matsuyama could bat as DH in four games. Matsuyama was the WS MVP that year, in part because of a 6 RBI game 6 – in New York. Had the NL won that nonsense All-Star game Matsuyama’s role would have been reduced, and there wouldn’t have been a DH in Game 6. No one can say that the Phillies would have won the world series, but the outcome certainly could have been different if it weren’t for an exhibition game that occurred months before hand.
The 09′ Phillies had 94 wins, the Yanks over 100.
I think people are missing the intended audience of the All-Star Game. I think it appeals to the fan who knows the stars and few others, who goes to his home ballpark and can name a couple players from the opposing team, and who didn’t know who Corey Kluber was until he won the Cy Young. For a fan like that, watching any old baseball game is not particularly exciting, just as I’m not terribly drawn to NPB games (go Kei Igawa! Come on, Wladimir Balentien! Wow, Huroki Kuroda can still pitch! OK, now I have no idea who these other guys are). But for that fan, the All-Star Game is a chance to see the guys he hears about. So I think we should leave it as is, appreciate it as a tribute to the game more than as a game itself, and of course it shouldn’t count for anything (and home field advantage should be determined by record).
I hate to be obnoxious and point this out, but in your tournament each team can play a maximum of two games (their first round game and the championship game), so there would only be two opportunities for starters (and you probably wouldn’t get to use the 8 other pitchers if you want meaningful starts).
Why Tony Watson over Andrew Miller? Miller is having a good year. And A.J. Pollock’s been better than Justin Upton or Brantley, but that 25-29 year old team is stacked. Nevertheless, any system rewarding Jeurys Familia and Trevor Rosenthal (not that they aren’t good players) over King Felix and David Price is not recognizing excellence.
Like it or not, the game has been much better since they added the HFA incentive. I would like to see a three game series with the HFA based off that. Three games would make it easier on managers to play everyone appropriately and a “series” is more in keeping with baseball logic. Have even more expanded rosters to bring more players.
Monday and Friday are off days.
Precede each game with minor league events, home run events, etc.
I couldn’t help but notice there were no Astros despite the fact that they are in first place. I’m not not knocking it but am surmising you are against the every team must be represented rule.
Two things:
1) you need more SP and less RP and SP NEED to be on a pitch/innings count of no more than probably 30 or so pitches or 2-3 innings. The all-star game should not negatively influence any player in their ability to participate in their next regular season game in any way.
2) I like the tourney format concept much more than the age bracketing concept. The age bracketing isn’t so much interesting as it is inherently flawed. How about instead, (and I really don’t see how this could work at all) either a 6 team tourney comprised of each divisions best players (ie. AL Central vs NL West). Or if 6 teams causes too many games to be played, then a 3 team tourney (comprised of the best players from each ‘time zone’: so AL/NL Central vs AL/NL East vs AL/NL West) and then do a round robin style tourney where each team plays each other once and we take best record/score differential, etc.
If wanting to go exactly 4 teams, (which is the best way I think), then perhaps we can do some mixing and matching between teams, like the top half teams with the best record in the NL comprise one team, and the bottom half teams record-wise comprise another, and then again with the AL. This sounds flawed but because even the worst team should have one or two superstars to contribute, it shouldn’t be as flawed but rather much more interesting in my opinion.
I guess it really depends what we want out of an All-Star game. I’m not sure I need a competitive all-star game. I like it as a light hearted showcase of some of the most popular or talented players in the game, and to be able to celebrate whichever city is hosting. I’d be fine with the current game if they simply didn’t make it count, stopped trying to force it to be competitive, and found a better voting system.
To me, the bigger problem the All-Star game faced last year was over-production. Too many Joe Buck Serious Talks, too many commercials, too many tributes. Keep it light and casual.
I’m confused. If the lack of stud starters in the game is a problem, why not just get rid of some of the relievers? It doesn’t make sense for there to be twice as many no name relievers as there are stud starters, when the starters could just pitch for an inning or two from the relief role. I’m sure everyone would rather watch Felix, Kluber and Harvey come in and only get two outs than guys the Keone Kela. Other than that rather confusing decision, I like this idea quite a bit.
It’s fun to see what happens when Dave Cameron gets drunk on Friday night.
I am amazed how such a usually brilliant baseball mind can come up with such a insanely bad idea for overhauling the Allstar game.
Here, I was reading this article, curious if Dave actually had cracked some code on how to make the ASG more watchable.
And the result is.. Crap.
Hopefully, we won’t have to listen to any discussion of this in the weekly podcast.
Let’s quickly forget this grave misstep in Daves otherwise glorious career.
As noted above, one way to involve more starters is to simply use more starters. Alternatively, let each team that wins their first game replace their original three starters (who presumably just pitched) with three new starters for game 2.
It’s a great overhaul, but I suggest some changes:
– drop the competition part and just make it two exhibition games.
– pick two all-star teams either with the old format or something like the 25-29 and 30-34 groups. This is the usual all-star game on Tuesday.
– from what’s left over, pick a Futures team (18-24)–with major leaguers and top prospects–and a Heroes team (35+). This could even include a few recent retirees who are still in shape. They play Monday. This game would be a huge hit for a number of reasons: parents and kids can root for their “generation” teams. New stars are introduced alongside the heroes. And if retired players played–imagine the ratings and fanfare if Jeter played for an at bat and inning this year?
– both games end in 9 innings no matter if it’s a tie. Maybe designate a home run derby guy on each team–and go to a 10-out derby to break the tie. But I don’t think it matters.
I don’t see my name… Weird
I understand why many fans would prefer that the home field advantage go to the team with the best overall record. It’s an idea that seems perfectly logical, except it for one flaw: a team in a bad division that faces NL opponents from a bad division may well attain the best overall record, but be markedly inferior to a team that faced more formidable opposition.
How’s this for an innovative proposal: Let the AL have the home field on year, and the NL have it the next.
I mean it worked for damn near 100 years. Why not go back to it?
I like the idea I have a few of my own tweaks.
1.All starting position players and SP and best closer voted in by the fans.
2.Utility players and additional pitchers selected by the managers
3. The stats count towards the regular season.
4. winning team players get $500,000 bonus each. Sounds like a ton but pennies to what MLB makes off it. Losers walk away with $100K each
5. All Star MVP gets additional $500k bonus
6. Whoever wins or loses it does not have a bearing on the the World Series home field positioning.
7. Add in a few other events aside from the home run derby as well Examples:
A. weight lifting contest.
B. 500 yard dash.
C. hot dog eating contest
D. Dunk booth. Pitchers get to throw pitches at a dunk machine that has the opposing teams managers sitting inside.
Just a few ideas. Didn’t think on them to long but I love the idea of making the stats count towards the regular season and giving players a real reason to put forth 100% effort instead of playing not to get injured.
Brilliant, Dave. The only casual-fan-friendly tweak would be to make Derek Jeter “shortstop for life” for the 35+ team. We could call it “Team Re2pect.”
Why not have captains pick their rosters? Didn’t the NHL start doing that this year? I think that would be fun, especially if the choosing were done right there on the field with the 50 or so players standing there. Choose up sides and play ball (in an exhibition that counts for nothing).
Give the vote back to the players. Or Alternate the way the voting works. One year players pick the starters, then writers, then fans,… A rookie game is ok, but I don’t want to see old cogers trying to relive their playing days. Cut the garbage and hoopla out, homerun contest is still good but have a rep from each team and a bracket. Too many people on each team also. Cut the roster down. Baseball is the only sport that actually plays its game. Hockey no checking, basketball do defense, football no defense or hard play. Baseball, at least the pitcher is trying his hardest to get you out and the hitter is trying his hardest to get a hit. I’m neither here no there with the outcome determining home team, so… Stats can be deceiving but at least have the top players in certain stat. catagories from the previous year be on the team. Puig shoud have never been in his first year with a half year of stats.
Do away with voting entirely and make it 100% performance-based. WAR, what is it good for? Uhh, this exact kind of thing.
If there is one clear upside to the KC voting debacle, it is that if anything is going help change the ASG, this will. MLB and the owners will be more likely to change it after the starting roster is mostly players who are neither top at their position or well known by casual fans, and far fewer people watch it.
So just let it happen.
There’s no perfect fix but this sounds a lot worse than the current format. You’re missing some obvious All-Stars and including players who have no business being anywhere near the festivities.
How in the world could your proposed squads omit SP’s Sonny Gray and Bartolo Colon?!?!
Hate the ASG “counting” toward the WS home team. The team with the best regular season record should be the home team, period. If they’re deadlocked on winning percentage, you can adopt a million differen tie-breakers.
As for continuing the ASG, I can see how it serves to showcase the game of baseball, but I wouldn’t be heartbroken if it went away. No way MLB owners, MLBPA, ESPN, etc., are going to allow that to happen.
I just want the MLB to do the same thing as the AA Eastern League All Star game did for the Home Run Derby a few years ago.
http://www.crossingbroad.com/2012/01/the-fing-insane-reading-phillies-all-star-hitting-challenge-is-awesome.html
YOUR 2015 AL ALL-STAR TEAM:
C: R. Martin; S. Vogt
1B: M. Cabrera; M. Teixeira
2B: J. Kipnis; B. Dozier
SS: J. Iglesias; X. Bogaerts
3B: J. Donaldson; M. Machado
OF: M. Trout; Y. Cespedes, K. Kiermaier; L. Cain; A. Jones; J. Reddick
DH: J. Bautista; N. Cruz
SP: C. Archer; C. Kluber; S. Gray
Is this a lineup anyone would want to watch to play the NL? It is right? No one has any problems with it? All these players, when their names come up, people who watch and analyze the game would probably use the phrase “That’s guys pretty awesome” more often than not to describe their baseball prowess, am I right???
OK those are the fangraphs WAR leaders per position. That is the answer to this problem. Make it 100% about good baseball players and not popularity.