Major League Baseball Making Players Vote For The ASG Using a Paper Ballot And Snail Mail Is So Incredibly Major League Baseball
As you know by now, the best pitcher in the AL, Blake Snell, did not make the All Star team. And as you probably know, baseball people LOVE the All Star Game. It’s another one of those weird baseball things that only baseball people understand. The ASG is so important to both players and die hard baseball fans alike. It is pretty arbitrary of an honor- fans generally vote for their favorite players, teams use big PR pushes to get their guys voted in, and many times some of the best players are left out because of how 1 player from each team needs to make the team, making the honor even more frivolous.
Despite that though, it’s fair to say Blake Snell was snubbed, everyone can agree on that. It’s probably because he plays in Tampa, he is relatively new to the Majors (3rd pro year, and the last 2 seasons he’s stunk), and players are more loyal to their buds and not to Blake Snell. Fair. Still though, it’s fair to say he was snubbed by the vote, but the bigger and better story is how the players vote, as told by Justin Verlander.
YES! That is the MLB we know and love. Let’s go through the checklist:
1) Refuse to use YouTube. What kind of dumb company wouldn’t put their videos on the world’s largest video sharing website? Wow, talk about stupid!
2) Don’t allow fans to share their own videos of awesome plays on Twitter. While the NBA encourages fans to record their TVs and share plays ASAP because they understand how the Internet works, MLB will ban your account if you do it for a home run.
3) It takes MLB upwards of 10-15 minutes to get a video of an awesome play up on their Twitter/website. I think they have 1 guy sitting in a room doing every game. By the time a Bryce Harper HR finally gets up on Twitter, the world has already moved on and doesn’t care.
And now,
4) Requires players to fill out a paper ballot and send it back via snail mail to vote for the All Star team. Classic. Sure, they could easily be sent an online ballot that any competent coder could put together in a few hours, but instead, the MLB is making players open mail, fill out a ballot, and then give it to some clubhouse intern to send back. WEEKS before the game too, so then someone in MLB HQ can tally the votes by hand, assumably. It’s is so 1950s, it’s so perfectly MLB. If there is an easy, more up to date way to do something, the MLB wants nothing to do with it. You almost have to respect their unwillingness to change.
Is the paper ballot system why Snell wasn’t voted in? Not necessarily. It has more to do with the reasons I stated above (name recognition, etc). But this debacle shedding light on another MLB blunder is perfect. And probably nothing will change, which makes me smile with delight.
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PS: Remember when there was so much outrage about a god damn ALL STAR GAME ending in a tie that the game then gave the league that won home field advantage for the freaking World Series? Still the most bizarre decision ever. We have pitchers grooving 85 MPH fastballs down the middle to Derek Jeter while home field in the World Series is on the line. Absolutely astonishing that rule got passed at all, and that it went on for so, so long. An exhibition game deciding home field. Only baseball.