This time it counts. We have heard it every year since the 2002 All Star Game ended in a tie after 12 innings and each side ran out of pitchers. Since then, the winner of the game receives home field advantage in the World Series. Many laughed this off, but it is actually a pretty good idea. The problem is, while the MLB commissioner’s office has spent the last eight years trying to convince us, the general public, that the All Star Game is meaningful, they forget to relay the message to the managers.

I am in the minority of people that actually enjoy the All Star Game. How can you not? You have the best of the best going up against each other. When Robinson Cano and Carl Crawford are your eight and nine hitters you can’t deny that every at bat isn’t going to be exciting. Where people lose interest is in the fact that the managers treat it like a little league game.

If the game really meant anything, Albert Pujols wouldn’t be the first player taken out of the game and Matt Capps and Matt Thornton, no disrespect, wouldn’t be pitching in one of the biggest spots. I can understand not wanting the starters to throw 120 pitches, but couldn’t you at least have David Price go four innings, Jon Lester go four innings, and than have Mariano Rivera close it out? Instead, every player on the bench got into the game, and no pitcher went more than two innings. Because of this, you had David Ortiz get caught in between first and second base on a short fly ball that dropped in ultimately getting thrown out at second base. Had the bench not been exhausted, you could have pinch ran for Ortiz, and it would have been first and second with only one out. Instead, there were two, with a man on first, and Ian Kinsler ended the game in the next at bat.

If you want this to be a meaningless game where hustle and competition is optional than turn it into a slow pitch softball game. But don’t shit on a plate and try to convince me it’s a prime rib. If the game is supposed to count, which is what they have been feeding us for eight years now, than lets really make it count. Otherwise, it’s really just another embarrassing attempt by the commissioners office to swindle it’s fans and make a quick buck.