CPF Candidate for Commisioner of Baseball

[batmagadanleadoff]

Who's complaining? Eight year olds? Mike Francesca (same thing)? This is a pressing problem?

[Benjamin Grimm]

Who came up with the elitist notion to limit it to season ticket holders? Terrible idea!

I think coming up with a foolproof way to ensure one fan-one vote is probably a lot more trouble than it's worth. But the idea of making it hard to vote more than once seems to make sense. Instead of 25 votes per IP address, why not one vote per IP address? Maybe you could make fans register to vote, with an MLB ID that's linked to their e-mail address. Sure, some people will vote more than once, but very few will vote 100 or more times.

I have to say, though, that I really don't care at all about any of this! Maybe that would make me a bad commissioner, but I've already publicly endorsed G-Fafif.

[Ceetar]

How about strict statistical formula so that All-Star isn't merely a vote but actually a badge like "Honor Roll"?

You could set it hard and fast (.770 OPS or 15 HR, or 100 Ks) or make it propotional. top 3 SS by OPS get in. Or by some other formula. Then you take all the honorees and have the fans vote from that pool for starters.

I mean, most of it's not gonna happen because MLB is happy to push this as a marketing thing and driving traffic to the site to vote and PR campaigns and all that. I guess you could still do that if you held a vote on June 10th and then campaigned for a month though.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Oooh! A campaign!

I can just see the commercials. A black-and-white closeup of a ballplayer, as ominous music plays.

Voice:
Bill Smith wants to be an All-Star third baseman. But he was 0 for 12 in last year's Division Series. And he's made FOUR throwing errors in the last month. Call Bill Smith and tell him he's WRONG for the All-Star team!

[batmagadanleadoff]

If it was up to me, I'd modify the rule requiring that every team have an all-star selectee. I'd make it permissible for a team to go a few years (three or four) without having an all-star selectee. Only the host team would get an automatic representative -- that would've meant Mets only, and not the Yankees for last year's Citi Field ASG.

I'd also try to revive the old ASG culture where every selectee does not automatically get into the actual game.

[Frayed Knot]

My only suggestion--and it's been the same one for years--is that they start the balloting so early in the year that you virtually encourage fans to vote for names rather than whoever is having the best year.
If you make the voting period run from the first of June to the first of July (or thereabouts) you'd get better ballots (can leave off Prince Fielder this year, for instance and add say Houston's George Springer) plus make the votes and the voting period itself more meaningful. But, like the multiple ballot strategy itself, delaying things even a day would probably be seen as crime against multiple website traffic clicks so my suggestion stands less and less chance of being implemented each year.

That said, I view the AS balloting and results as the most minor of problems. I preferred it when things had at least the whiff of integrity (i.e., when all 30 teams were NOT openly encouraging you to vote only for in-house faves) but this is not something I get all bent out of shape about.

[Guest Mets Guy in Michigan]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: If MLB changes anything it would be to increase the number of "votes" (ad impressions) it provides for fans. Of course its a flawed system but it's long since stopped being about integrity.

Bingo. It likes the idea of people looking at that page over and over, being engaged with MLB and its products.

I love the All-Star Game, and baseball has the only one that people give a darn about. The fans, ballot-stuffers as they may be, mostly get it right, though I reserve the right to bellyache should Jeter end up starting -- until the game starts and the NL hitters keep slapping balls to short and circling the bases for three innings.

[ashie62]

How about letting the players coaches and managers select the all star team?

[Frayed Knot]

Ashie62 wrote: How about letting the players coaches and managers select the all star team?

- they already have a partial say, at least as far as AS reserves goes
- managers have near total control over the pitcher selections and every year there's at least as much complaining about those choices as there is about the starting eight elected by the fans
- the Gold Gloves are the one post-season awards selected, not by the writers, but by the managers & coaches and those are almost without exception, the worst choices