American League Looks Lost as National League Dominates With a 5-1 Victory

Last night I was looking forward to watching Michael Cuddyer play in his first All Star game, but in reality I only saw Cuddyer for a brief second before he would fly out to right-field. As the night went on, and the innings flew by, I kept asking myself is this really the All Star game? It seemed like the American League had dinner reservations for later in the night, so instead of playing baseball; it seemed like the American League were practicing their golf swings, by the way they kept swinging and missing.

What has happened to baseball? What I am trying to say is what we watched last night the result of making this game cleaner? Or has baseball became like the NBA and all the superstars leave for the other league(National League). I noticed that most of the American League players looked older then the National League, so I did some research on the starting lineups for both teams, and only Asdrubal Cabrera, and Alex Avila, and Robinson Cano are the only starters under the age of 30 for the American League, and Cabrera was not even suppose to start, because Derek Jeter was the starter but did not attend. The National League only had Lance Berkman, Scott Rolen, and Matt Holiday who were over the age of 30, and Holiday was not even suppose to start also but Ryan Braun(27) was hurt. Has American League all of sudden became the "old timers" league? With Most of the National League under 30, and the American League stars heading for the AARP registration, it seems like the American League should now be called the senior circuit.

We listened to Joe Buck last night mention how the American League did not have Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, Felix Hernandez, Jon Lester, David Price, Mariano Rivera, CC Sabathia, Justin Verlander; but in reality would these "old timers" minus Price, Hernandez and Lester really help the American League? For heaven sakes all the National League had to do was throw the Philadelphia Phillies starting rotation out there, and have Brian Wilson save the game. The American League would just stand there in awe at Brian Wilson beard. 

To me it seems that the American League is stuck in the past, and not preparing for the future, which last night the National league displayed that they are ready for the future. Home runs are not the answer any more, it all comes down to speed, defense, and pitching, pitching, and more pitching. Since 2002 there have been five American League Cy Young winners now playing in the National league(Barry Zito, Roy Halladay, Johan Santana, Cliff Lee, Zack Greinke), has the National League conspired together to take away talented pitchers from the American League? probably not, but we cant rule that out. Even if the American League could not out pitch the National League, you would think they could out hit them right? Not exacually, because the American League had only one MVP winner on their team last night since 2000, and that was Josh Hamilton who won it last year(Jason Giambi-2000,Ichiro Suzuki-2001, Miquel Tejada-2002, Alex Rodriquez-2003-2005-2007, Vladimir Guerrero-2004, Justin Morneau-2006, Dustin Pedroia-2008, and Joe Mauer-2009 all were not there last night for the American League). So with no Cy Young winners, and with only one lone MVP on their roster the American League chances were very bleak even before the first pitch was thrown.

If this game is really suppose to matter then we need to take away the rule that if you pitch on Sunday you cannot pitch in the All Star game, because that is how the American League lost all of its Cy Young Caliber pitchers, because of that stupid rule. Another thing that needs to be reevaluated is who the fans select into the All Star game, we need to quite giving Jeter the selection, because he does not deserve it; another thing is where was Ichiro, and Evan Longoria last night? Instead we had Matt Joyce, and Howard Kendrick, which are not equal to the level where Ichiro and Longoria are at in their careers.

I feel like the American League is stuck in the 2000's when the American League dominated, but we are in a new decade where the National League is up 2-0 already, and the American League seems lost. With no real dominate position players besides Cano, and Adrian Gonzalez, and their pitching rotation lacking any true Cy Young winner besides a handful of pitchers, the American League looks to have a rough few years until they ditch the old cliche "chicks dig the long ball", and focus more on pitching, and defense, and a little thing we call plate discipline.