Garry Templeton, once of the St. Louis Cardinals, said this about the All-Star Game: "If I ain't startin', I ain't departin'."
The politics, incentive clauses, managerial prejudices, ballot stuffing and mindless rules, like you can be on the disabled list and appear, in the All-Star game make the Midsummer Classic in many ways - Midsummer Mockery.
It wasn't always this way and it wasn't intended to be this way.
The original idea was conceived in 1933 by Arch Ward, the Chicago Tribune's sports editor. He saw the game as a one-shot deal to be played in conjunction with Chicago's Century of Progress Exposition. He said the event should be called the "Game of the Century". The plan was to give the fans a real baseball rooting interest by allowing them to vote for their favorite players via popular ballot.
The first game was played on July 6, 1933, a sweltering afternoon at the old Comiskey Park in Chicago. There were 47,595 fans in attendance to see the National League team managed by John J. McGraw go against the American League squad managed by Connie Mack.
Both rosters were limited to 18 players. Mack made just one starting lineup change and wound using a total of 13 players. McGraw employed 17 players, including four pinch hitters.
That first American League team had sluggers like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx and Al Simmons. Lefty Gomez of the New York Yankees was the starting and winning pitcher for the American League and Wild Bill Hallahan of the St. Louis Cardinals was the starter and loser for the National League.
Hallahan fanned Ruth in the first inning, but he was not as fortunate in the third inning of that first All-Star Game. The Babe came up with Detroit's Charlie Gehringer on first base.
The 38-year-old Ruth slugged a Hallahan pitch just inside the right-field foul line and into the lower stands. That two-run homer was the margin in the American League's 4-2 victory.
"We wanted to see the Babe," said Wild Bill Hallahan. "Sure, he was old and had a big waistline, but that didn't make any difference. We were on the same field as Babe Ruth."
Also by Harvey Frommer
» Yankee Stadium's First Opening Day
» The Birth of Baseball's First Professional Team
» Yankee Stadium's First Opening Day
» Gehrig's Streak
» Willie Mays and the Month of May
» Reese was no Pee Wee
» Yankees vs. Red Sox: Baseball's Greatest Rivalry
» Celebrating Hank Greenberg
» Bobby Thomson's Famous Homer Lives On
» Remembering the Yankee Clipper: Joe DiMaggio
» Shoeless Joe Remains a Scapegoat
» The Mets Have Always Been Amazing
» More submissions
Copyright © 2002 by Harvey Frommer. Posted June 17, 2002.
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