All it takes is showing MLB with dough.
How does a city get a Major League Baseball All Star Game? Just spend money and either renovate a ballpark or give an owner a whole new facility. It is simple. Or maybe not as simple as that if you listen to MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred. “There are a whole host of factors that go into deciding who’s going to get an All Star Game, and I don’t view whether you have a Pride Night or not as a outcome-determinative issue. It’s an issue. We look at all those issues and make the best decision and try to give it to the place that we think is going to kind of be the best in terms of marketing of the game. I think it’s really important to remember here — here there’s a massive public investment in terms of creating a great new facility and that obviously is an important consideration in terms of awarding All-Star Games.”
Manfred finally got around to the point. Spend money on your local owner. Manfred said MLB made a mistake and got too politically involved by pulling the 2021 All Star Game out of Cobb County, Georgia. “I made the decision in 2021 to move the event, and I understand, believe me, that people had then and probably still have different views as to the merits of that decision. One of the things we’ve learned over time is that the more we stay out of political issues, the better off we are.” Manfred removed the All-Star events and the amateur draft from Cobb County, Georgia after discussions with individual players and the Players Alliance, an organization of Black players formed after the death of George Floyd in 2020. The game ended up in Denver. Cobb County hosts the event in 2025.The lesson? Don’t talk politics unless you need public money for a stadium.
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Evan can be reached at evan_weiner@hotmail.com
