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Major League Baseball’s best take the field Tuesday night in Atlanta as the All-Star game takes center stage. In a tradition-rich sport, the Mid-summer Classic used to command everyone’s attention every July and provided some of the sport’s most famous moments- think Pete Rose barreling into Ray Fosse. In recent years, however, the game has fallen into the shadow of the Home Run Derby, where eight sluggers try to outslug each other and the clock. Legendary sportscaster and lifelong baseball fan Warner Wolf falls into the camp of baseball traditionalist. He appeared on 710 WOR’s Mendte in the Morning program to deride the priorities baseball puts on the contest rather than the game.
Wolf told host Larry Mendte that the Derby is nothing more than glorified batting practice, and should be tougher: “How about that pumped-up, over-hyped Home Run Derby tonight? The hitters choose their own warm-up pitchers- who are not major leaguers- who throw it right down the middle with nothing on it, every pitch. Make it a real test! Get established pitchers who try and strike the batter out and let’s see how many home runs he hits.”
Wolf also pointed out a sudden trend that harkens to the possible return of the complete game: “What’s going on? We actually had four complete games last week- four!... That’s 23 total complete games this year- old-time baseball! You know, in 1968, Bob Gibson had 28 complete games himself… Because of his record that year- he was 22-10 with an earned-run average of 1.12- that’s when they changed the height of the mound. It used to be 15 inches, so they lowered it to 10 inches, which is what it is now. That was the ‘Bob Gibson’ rule.”
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