The sport of baseball features some fundamentals that don’t exactly adapt well to modern marketing needs:
- It is played virtually every day.
- It is played outside, generally.
- Its most valued contributors are extremely susceptible to significant injury because of the strain their primary responsibility puts on the body.
Which brings us to Jacob deGrom and next week’s All-Star Game, the industry’s celebration of all that is good that deGrom, the world’s best pitcher, planned to skip by virtue of his starting pitching assignment for the Mets two days prior and, as the ace told The Post’s Mike Puma, the locale of Coors Field in Denver, easily the most grueling site for pitchers thanks to the high altitude.
You couldn’t imagine LeBron James skipping the NBA’s All-Star Game, or Pat Mahomes blowing off the Pro Bowl (just kidding, everyone knows the NFL canceled the Pro Bowl 20 years ago). Yet deGrom not participating in the Midsummer Classic — or perhaps not going to Denver to join the National League roster during pregame introductions — wouldn’t rank as particularly aberrational. It’s how things go in baseball.
Should they work that way? Let’s tackle the issues at hand here.
1. It’s OK for deGrom to skip the All-Star Game.
Look, if the right-hander was wired differently, then he’d probably want to go to Denver, be it for the player-party scene or to meet with sponsors and boost his brand or just to revel in the festivities of the Home Run Derby and the game itself. However, you know darn well that’s not how deGrom rolls, and you can easily draw a line from his low-key approach to his sky-high success, which helps the sport far more than his blowing off the Denver trip hurts it.
2. Major League Baseball should move the All-Star Game to Wednesday, three days after the final game of the “first half.”
“First half” in quotation marks because it’s more spiritual than technical; the Mets became the last team to reach the actual halfway mark on Monday night. Anyway, as tight as baseball’s calendar runs in order to play 162 regular-season games plus the postseason without weather nightmares on either end, it remains silly that the calendar simply disqualifies all Sunday pitchers from such a valued appearance. More importantly, it’s avoidable.
Here’s how you do it:
• Sunday: Wrap up the first half.
• Monday: Futures Game
• Tuesday: Home Run Derby
• Wednesday: All-Star Game
• Thursday and Friday: Amateur draft, as nearly all the major league players rest. Schedule one game for national broadcast on Friday night
• Saturday: Full schedule resumes
• Sunday: Single-admission doubleheader (with seven-inning games, naturally) for every series besides the one that started on Friday night. Emulate the Mets and hold Banner Day everywhere between contests.
You’re welcome, MLB.
3. A Met should take deGrom’s spot on the NL roster.
Pretty remarkable that only deGrom made the cut from a division leader, even the worst division’s leader. MLB can do as it wishes in choosing the 33-year-old’s replacement, and you have to think the league will make sure that the Mets get some bona fide representation.
“One hundred percent, I would like to see Taijuan [Walker] in there and maybe Edwin [Diaz],” Luis Rojas said Tuesday afternoon at Citi Field, before deGrom and the Mets were scheduled to take on the Brewers. “I would love the guys to have the chance to participate in that event because those guys earned it.”
For sure. Walker, one of the best free-agent signings of last winter, ranked eighth in the NL with a 2.44 ERA through Monday’s action. Diaz, who has shined with the return of crowds after seeming to struggle with that component back in 2019, placed seventh in the NL with 18 saves. Either would serve as a fine substitute for deGrom and would give Mets fans a reason to watch.