Major League Baseball’s All Star celebration technically got underway yesterday even though they basically buried the Futures Game from existence by playing it concurrent with actual MLB games – Alfredo Duno started, caught 4.0 IP, and hit a 400 foot fly ball to CF that was caught.
Tonight, though, comes the Home Run Derby, and MLB isn’t about to take that lightly in the marketing department. In fact, they’ve gone out of their way to hype the revamped format, and this edition will be carried by Netflix
and Netflix only.
The event gets underway at 8 PM ET. It’ll feature Red Sox slugger Willson Contreras, Jordan Walker of St. Louis, Jac Caglianone from Kansas City, Munetaka Murakami of the Pale Hose, Yankees slugger Ben Rice, Tampa’s Junior Caminero, and a pair of Philadelphia homers in Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper (the event and All Star Game are in Philadelphia, if you weren’t aware).
A fun twist this year is that there’s no longer a timed clock against which the sluggers must face – this time, they’ll get a finite number of swings and the most dingers launched on those swings takes the cake. Longest homer will be the tiebreaker should there be a tie in Round 1, while a three-swing swing-off will break any ties in subsequent rounds.
We’ll see if it makes the event more watchable!
