The first All-Star Game at Dodger Stadium since 1980 featured Clayton Kershaw starting in front of his home crowd, and appearances from two legends, Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrea, but the final tally looked all too familiar. The American League won 3-2 for its ninth consecutive All-Star victory and 21st in the past 25 Midsummer Classics.
The game turned on its head in the fourth inning when Yankee slugger Giancarlo Stanton and Minnesota Twins Byron Buxton delivered back-to-back jacks off the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Tony Gonsolin. Stanton’s game tying two-run shot was a 457-foot blast to left-center, longer than any home run hit at Dodger Stadium in the first half of the season. Buxton followed that up with a 425-foot mammoth shot down the left-field line, the seventh time in All-Star history with back-to-back home runs.
Stanton, making his first All-Star appearance for the “Bronx Bombers” since the team acquired him from the Miami Marlins before the 2018 campaign, took home MVP honors with his first All-Star knock. In his previous All-Star contest, he was a combined 0-for-6.
Stanton is now one of five players to win a league MVP Award, a Home Run Derby and an All-Star Game MVP, joining Ken Griffey Jr., Miguel Tejada, Cal Ripken Jr. and Dave Parker. Stanton also is the third Yankees player to win All-Star MVP, along with Derek Jeter (2000) and Mariano Rivera (2013).
Stanton’s Yankee career has had peaks and valleys, including missing the majority of the 2019 and 2020 seasons with injuries, but he has 24 home runs mid-way through the season, a key contributor of a deep Yankees roster that has a chance to exceed the franchises record of 114 wins set in 1998.
It was a memorable homecoming for Stanton, who grew up going to Dodgers games and attending Notre Dame High School in nearby Sherman Oaks.
“I would sit in left field and try to scalp tickets, whatever we could afford,” he said. “To hit one out there is amazing.”
Among the 50 tickets he gave to family and friends, was one for his father.
“My pops took me to my first Dodgers game and showed me how to love this game,” Stanton said.
Buxton praised Stanton’s long ball from the on-deck circle.
“That’s probably one of the hardest balls I’ve seen hit from the on-deck circle,” Buxton said. “I don’t even know if you can put it in words how hard he hit the baseball. So for me to see him in person, be on the same team, finally be up close, it was like, ‘Wow.’ You know, like, I literally sat down. … He crushed that.”
As Buxton stepped to the plate, he said he thought: “I ain’t matching that.” He came close.
Stanton’s Yankee teammate Nestor Cortes, who pitched a scoreless sixth inning, said he will sometimes stand at shortstop during batting practice.
“He hits balls to me, it’s so hard to react,” Cortes said. “When Stanton and [Aaron] Judge connect, it’s incredible how hard, how loud, how far the ball goes.”
American League pitchers shutout National League batters from the second through the seventh innings, just the fourth time in All-Star history a team went at least 20 at-bats without a hit.
Cleveland Guardians closer Emmanuel Clase made his All-Star debut and finished the game, striking out Garrett Cooper on three pitches, fanning Kyle Schwarber on three throws and then blowing a 1-2 99 mph cutter past Jake Cronenworth, just missing an immaculate inning.
For the Dodgers fateful in attendance, the night was mostly about the opportunity to witness Kershaw start an All-Star Game for the first time in his historic career. The nine-time All-Star gave up a leadoff single to Shohei Ohtani before picking him off at first base to the cheers from the fans on his way to a scoreless inning.
“I tried to take a minute at the beginning to take it all in and look around, which I usually never do,” Kershaw said. “And I think the moment itself, being here at Dodger Stadium, a place where I’ve been now for 15 years, to get to do something like this with the best in the world, is really fun. And it was also really personal for me and my family, everybody. I’m excited it’s over. I did OK. I got out of there with no runs.”
MLB added two legends of the game this year in Pujols and Cabrera. Pujols, winner of three MVP awards, is fifth on the career home run list and third in RBIs and is playing his final season, returning to the St. Louis Cardinals after 10 seasons with the Los Angeles Angels and Dodgers. He pinch hit in the fourth inning and elicited a momentary cheer from the crowd with a towering fly ball to left field, but it was caught just in front of the warning track.
With his 3,000th career hit in April, two-time MVP Cabrera became just the seventh player with both 3,000 hits and 500 home runs — and one of just two to also have a .300 career average. He entered the game in the fifth inning and grounded out to shortstop.
