Lou Pickney's Online Commentary
All-Star Stumble
Wednesday
July 10, 2002
I came in from work this morning to find a message on my answering machine. It was from my friend Phil Murphy, who was calling me... from the 9th row at Miller Park at last night's baseball All-Star Game. How crazy is that? Turns out that Phil's girlfriend's uncle had extra tickets, so presto they got to go. Not a bad gig, huh. Even if the game did end in a tie.
Speaking of which, baseball needs to establish that the All-Star Game should end after nine innings. Period. I don't think that's unreasonable. Better that than the "let's appeal to the commissioner on what to do" situation we saw at the middle of the 11th last night. Now I can sympathize with the managers, who didn't feel comfortable perhaps putting a rival team's pitcher in jeopardy. But this arbitrary stop was downright embarassing. The 1987 All-Star game went to 13 innings (tied at 0-0, I might add) before Tim Raines won it for the NL.
But in many ways, last night's All-Star game capsulated all that's right and wrong with baseball. We saw some great athleticism (Torii Hunter's great catch, robbing Barry Bonds of a home run), excellent pitching, good power hitting... and then the debacle in the 11th. A meltdown because of poor planning, leading to angry fans loudly booing. Has there ever been a display like that at any sort of All-Star Game/Pro Bowl? I don't know of it. Ugh.
The new Counting Crows CD remains strong on the second and third listen. Nice. Looking forward to hearing what Carli has to say about it, plus her take on the new Red Hot Chili Peppers CD (which I almost bought).
Finally reached the end of the Mr. Show tape I borrowed from Scott Massey. Now may be the time to hunt down the DVD...
Time for work now. Friday remains up in the air, but Jeff Berardelli's birthday party Saturday night at the Hyde Park Cafe should be nice. Later...
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