Sorry Fletch, but I gotta disagree with you on this one. Baseball is the one sport out of the four major sports (and most minor sports) that is not based on time. Some games last an hour and 59 minutes, some games last 5 hours. That, in and of itself, is part of the beauty of the game. Regardless of how long the game takes or how many innings it goes, one thing has always been a given......."We'll just keep on playing until somebody wins this game......" It's difficult to even put baseball and "tie" in the same sentence together. It doesn't even look right. In addition, baseball is the only sport where it's All-Star game is taken somewhat seriously. Yes, it's still an exhibition, but it's much more than that. I mean, this isn't the pro bowl on ESPN2 that nobody watches. Some of the most memorable moments in baseball have occured in All-Star games.
As far as the explanation that they ran out of pitchers, that's a cop-out. Pure and simple. Most games that I have watched, there is usually 1 pitcher (or more) that doesn't get into the game, And this is the exact reason why. Usually it's a starter who's normally scheduled to pitch that day and it's decided on before the game even starts. The manager goes up to......let's say.......Glavine or Smoltz and says "Hey.....you've been in 12 All-Star games, how do you feel about being our emergency pitcher in case the game goes into extra innings. Can ya give me 80 or so pitches?" Obviously that didn't happen tonight, so let's move on to another alternative. Each team still had 9 BASEBALL players out there. Surely somebody could have taken the hill and got the ball somewhere in the vicinity of home plate. If Scott Rolen or whoever can throw a lazer shot from 3B to nail a guy at first, surely he can get up there and throw a few eephus pitches. I mean, pitchers hit. Why can't batters pitch? The risk of injury of this is overrated and due mainly to when Canseco blew out his arm trying to throw a split-fingered knuckle-curve. There's already been 9 instances this year when a position player took the hill and took one for the team. In all of these instances, nobody was injured and more importantly, THEY COMPLETED THE DAMN GAME. Bottom line, you just can't have an All-Star game end in a tie. It's just not right.
it's a freaking all star game not the nlcs or something a manager cannot take a chance by running out someones stud just for an extra few innings of free baseball and you sure as hell cannot take a position player and take the chance of ending hid caree by trying to pitch and they couldnot send anyone out because there was noone left all players were used.there is no reentry rule in baseball.
