10 Events We'd Love to See at MLB's All-Star Weekend
In honor of NBA All-Star Weekend, and while baseball fans struggle for something to get excited about amid the ongoing MLB lockout, we've come up with some ideas to spice up MLB's own All-Star festivities.
As it stands, the annual All-Star Game is accompanied by the Home Run Derby, Futures Game and Celebrity Softball Game. The MLB draft was added to the mix last year, though it remains to be seen if that will continue going forward.
Ahead we've laid out 10 ideas for new events we'd like to see added to the slate.
It's a mix of logical and creative with just a sprinkle of nonsense, and it would no doubt make MLB All-Star Weekend a must-watch each year.
Let's start the fun!
Highest Exit Velocity
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With the growing popularity of exit velocity as a mainstream measure of hitting prowess, a challenge to measure who can hit a ball the hardest seems like a logical addition.
Unlike the Home Run Derby, where players are trying to launch towering fly balls in the outfield seats, the goal here would be to smoke line drives.
The NHL has its version of this event with the Hardest Shot challenge in which players crush a slap shot into the net while trying for the highest velocity. Adding an exit-velocity challenge would be a similar show of brute force on the baseball field.
To up the ante, why not let players use aluminum bats?
I'm not talking about the bats that are used at the high school and college levels now. I'm talking about the TPX Omaha you used in high school in 2001 that would be a legitimate weapon in the hands of today's MLB players.
This would be a hot ticket, since the only place fans would be safe is behind the home-plate netting.
Predicted Winner: Giancarlo Stanton
It has to be either Stanton or his teammate Aaron Judge, right? Those guys are just built different.
A Mascot Race...with Players in the Mascot Uniforms
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Why not get the league's mascots in on the All-Star Weekend festivities?
Better yet, why not put some of the game's biggest stars in those mascot suits and have them run around on the field?
That was the idea proposed by Twitter user Will Holder (@WillHolder9), who offered up examples like Fernando Tatis Jr. in a friar costume, Byron Buxton as "this bear thing" with a picture of Twins mascot T.C. Bear and Bryce Harper as the Phillie Phanatic.
Sign. Me. Up!
The Los Angeles Angels, Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees are the only teams that currently do not have a mascot, but that wouldn't be difficult to work around.
The beloved Sausage Race in Milwaukee and Presidents Race in Washington, D.C., have laid the groundwork, so now it's time to get some of the league's best players involved.
Predicted Winner: Ketel Marte
A lot of the mascot costumes are extremely bulky or have comically oversized heads that are going to make hitting top speed difficult. The Arizona Diamondbacks mascot Baxter is an absolute walking nightmare to look at, but he's built for speed.
Catcher Pop-Time Competition
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The idea of a throwing competition between catchers during All-Star Weekend is not a new one, as it was part of an all-around skills challenge during the 1989 All-Star Game. Here's an excerpt from the UPI Archives:
"Tony Pena of St. Louis and Benito Santiago of San Diego won the catcher's throw for accuracy over Oakland's Terry Steinbach and [Detroit's Mickey] Tettleton. Pena scored 21 points by throwing three balls through a target and hitting the target six times. Santiago tossed four through the hole and hit the target six other times. Steinbach and Tettleton were able to throw the ball through the target only once between them."
Better technology means the event could now focus on a catcher's pop time, which is the time between when a pitch hits the catcher's glove and his throw to second base on an attempted steal reaches the covering player's glove. The average pop time in the majors is roughly 2.0 seconds, with anything under 1.8 considered great.
The setup could be as simple as a sensor in the catcher's glove that starts the clock and a sensor on a target at second base that stops it.
Predicted Winner: Yadier Molina
Even at 39 years old, Molina would still have to be the overwhelming favorite to win this event, right?
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Fastest Outfield Throw
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As tempting as it is to include a Fastest Pitch competition on this list, there's simply no way teams would want their top arms trying to throw the ball as hard as possible. The risk of injury is simply too high, especially in such a competitive environment.
However, they could incorporate velocity by measuring an outfielder's throws to home plate.
New York Yankees center fielder Aaron Hicks was clocked at 105.5 mph on a throw to home plate in 2016, so the potential is there for some triple-digit reading on the radar gun.
The competition also wouldn't necessarily have to be limited to only outfielders, though a throw from the outfield to home plate makes sense as the standard for measuring throw velocity.
Predicted Winner: Hunter Renfroe
Renfroe tied for the MLB lead with 16 outfield assists last year, and his 30 assists over the past three seasons led all outfielders during that span.
Fly-Ball Competition
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I asked my editor if he had any ideas for this article.
He said: "Catching balls that are shot out of a cannon super high in the air."
Sold!
If cheerleaders can shoot balled-up clothes into the stands at sporting events with a T-shirt cannon, how hard could it really be to build a cannon that shoots baseballs into the air with enough height and accuracy to create a legitimate challenge for MLB outfielders?
Surely our best engineers would be up to the task.
The idea of a Gold Glove-caliber outfielder reduced to looking like a lost Little Leaguer as he tries to settle under a baseball that just grazed Earth's atmosphere sounds like something that could give the Home Run Derby a run for its money in terms of entertainment value.
Predicted Winner: Mookie Betts
With five Gold Glove Awards, elite speed and the kind of instincts you can't teach, Betts is as good a candidate as any to walk away as the winner of this challenge.
Race Around the Bases
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The proposed mascot race would be a lot of fun to watch, but it wouldn't exactly be a great gauge of baseball's fastest players.
Instead, a simple race around the bases could be used to determine baseball's speediest players, and a bracket-style format would make for an interesting test of endurance as well.
Everyone would be flying in the first round, but what about on their fourth or fifth trip around the bases, depending on how many players are involved in the event?
There is some risk here of a pulled hamstring or a rolled ankle, and maybe a straight 90-foot sprint would be a safer way to judge baseball's fastest player, but a race around the bases would be a much more compelling event that could capture some of the excitement of an inside-the-park home run.
It would be interesting to see if some surprise contenders emerge, as some players are faster underway than they are busting it out of the batter's box going from home to first.
Predicted Winner: Trea Turner
Baseball Savant has a stat called "bolts" that is defined as a running event in which a player exceeds a speed of 30 feet per second. Turner led the majors with 147 bolts last year. No one else had more than 67.
Bunting Contest
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Remember the old coffin-corner punting drill in Madden that featured a yellow, orange and red bull's-eye you needed to get your punt to land inside?
That, but with bunting.
If you don't think a bunting competition makes for compelling entertainment, watch this video or any of the countless others like it of teams having their yearly bunting tournaments during spring training.
The idea of a sideline full of MLB superstars getting extremely invested in what is essentially a lost art in today's game is fun to think about, and this would give pitchers a chance to get in on the All-Star Weekend fun in a way that doesn't risk the health of their arms.
It would also provide a unique situation where pitchers and hitters could compete in the same challenge, as opposed to the usual head-to-head dynamic.
Predicted Winner: Joey Gallo
Bunting against the extreme shift that's employed against him, Gallo tied for the MLB lead with seven bunt hits in 2021. Not unlike Brent Barry winning the Slam Dunk Contest and leading the NBA in three-point percentage over one season in his NBA career, Gallo could pull off the Home Run Derby and Bunt Derby sweep.
Precision Hitting
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The gears should already be turning for anyone who remembers the Hitting Mini Game in the legendary MVP Baseball 2005 video game.
If you're not familiar, give this video a quick watch.
It's probably not feasible to fill a baseball field with elaborate rolling ramps, and I'm not sure the science exists to create a giant vortex in the middle of the field that sends balls back at you if you hit them in the wrong direction, but a scaled-down version of this exists that would make for a great precision hitting competition.
Drawing up hitting lanes that are worth different points and scattering bonus point targets around the field would give some of the league's best contact hitters an opportunity to showcase their ability to spray the ball from foul pole to foul pole.
Predicted Winner: Bo Bichette
Bichette ranked third in the majors with 63 opposite-field hits in 2021, and that's a skill that would play extremely well in our proposed competition format.
Retired Legends Whiffle' Ballgame
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Tired: A celebrity softball game.
Wired: A retired legends' whiffle ballgame.
The last time I remember truly enjoying the celebrity softball game was back when Kenny Mayne was still heavily involved in the event, and even then it was largely an afterthought that aired late at night following the Home Run Derby.
A pickup basketball game filled with celebrities is infinitely more entertaining than a pickup softball game, so let the NBA have the celebrity angle. MLB should focus instead on the sport's history for All-Star Weekend by bringing back some all-time greats each year for a game of whiffle ball.
One team would be filled with random legends, while another could be made up of former players from the host team to give the host city a bigger slice of the spotlight.
Attracting a younger audience is an ongoing talking point for Major League Baseball, and what better way to do that than by incorporating some bright yellow bats and a ball that defies the laws of physics in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing?
The Under-25 All-Star Game
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The league needs to do a better job putting its rising stars front and center.
While prospect nerds like me love the Futures Game, a better way to showcase the game's up-and-comers would be with an Under-25 All-Star Game that is played the day before the regular All-Star Game, similar to the Rising Stars game during NBA All-Star Weekend.
Here's what the starting lineups might have looked like in 2021:
- AL: SS Bo Bichette, LF Yordan Alvarez, 1B Vladimir Guerrero Jr., 3B Rafael Devers, RF Kyle Tucker, DH Ryan Mountcastle, CF Akil Baddoo, 2B Abraham Toro, C Ryan Jeffers, SP Luis Garcia
- NL: 3B Jonathan India, SS Fernando Tatis Jr., LF Juan Soto, 1B Austin Riley, 2B Ozzie Albies, CF Trent Grisham, RF Dylan Carlson, C Tyler Stephenson, SP Trevor Rogers
Similar to the Futures Game, some creative position shuffling within reason could ensure the best possible starting lineups for both teams. That's why you see Austin Riley at first base and Jonathan India at third base, to help maximize the NL lineup.
Ronald Acuna Jr. and Luis Robert were both injured, and Wander Franco had not yet hit his stride, or they would have been no-brainers for the team, too.
There would be no need to include a representative from every team, and they could even go with a shortened six-inning game for the sake of saving pitchers' arms, but it would be a nice way to show off the future of the sport.
All stats courtesy of FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.
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