Be Like Tike

Wednesday, July 11th, 2007 by Adam Wagner

Changes Necessary

The Home Run Derby has developed into the most important event of all of the All-Star festivities, as I stated yesterday. Players enjoy hitting in the Derby more than they enjoy sticking out three innings in the game, as Justin Morneau proved when he stated that the Derby was the coolest event of the festivities. The contest could, however, be improved, as there were at least 56 players with 14 homers, the number that winner Vladimir Guerrero had going into last night and 68 had at least as many as Magglio Ordonez. An event is not living up to its potential when there are at least 68 players as statistically good as in the competition. With that said, here are some ideas to improve the Derby.

First of all, the format is simply annoying, with the eight players hitting and then the top four moving on into head-to-head competition. There is just so much potential there for the competition to become even more enthralling than it already is, further replacing the Game as the most important event of the weekend. The way to accomplish this would be to start in heat play, with there being a “Legend” heat, a “Star” heat, and a “Future” heat.

For instance, this year the Legend heat would have consisted of Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr., Sammy Sosa, and Frank Thomas (or Gary Sheffield). These guys would generally be the very experienced sluggers, the guys who had already reached milestones and are now looking to make new records or pad their numbers. They should be borderline idolized or at least respected in the game.

The Stars group would include players such as Alex Rodriguez, Ryan Howard, Justin Morneau, and Adam Dunn. These guys should be recognizable by most fans of the game, but should also be putting up very good power numbers this season. For instance, if Pujols were having a better first half to his season, I would have inserted him into this group.

The Futures group should be players who project as sluggers for year to come, including guys like Prince Fielder, Miguel Cabrera, Alex Rios (this year), and David Wright. These players should be the ones that MLB wants to publicize and turn into household names, while the Derby would give them the perfect opportunity to be exposed to the public.

With that said, these hypothetical heats would only work if every player asked to participate were forced to participate and, with the Derby being one of the best chances for the game to promote itself, this should be enforced. If a player is healthy and chosen to participate in the Derby, he should do so.

Also, the expansion to 12 hitters means that in the heat stage each hitter would only have five outs to waste, instead of the too many ten that they currently receive. This would effectively shorten the competition so that the first round did not take up too much time. The current swing-off competition would stay in place in case of a tie, and there would be 10 outs in the ensuing rounds.

The way this competition would work is the opening round would take place, with each hitter using up his five outs. At the end of the opening round the leader in each heat would move onto the semi-finals with the non-leader with the highest totals also moving on.

For instance, say Bonds won the Legends heat with eight, Rodriguez won the Stars heat with four, and Fielder won the Futures heat with five. If Griffey had come in second in the Legends heat with seven, he would join the three leaders in the semi-finals. The semi-finals would be the typical most you can hit with ten outs competition, and the competition would continue in typical home run derby fashion from that point on, until the champion was crowned.

Of course, the thrilling ending to last night’s All-Star Game makes my point completely moot, but these changes are necessary and would make the Home Run Derby much more interesting than it currently is, even potentially bringing more fans to the game and allowing current fans to appreciate the fantastic past, the thriving present, and the potentially scintillating future that this game possesses.

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