1957 Major League Baseball All-Star Game

1957 Major League Baseball All-Star Game

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E American League 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 3 6 10 0 National League 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 3 5 9 1
Date	July 9, 1957
Venue	Busch Stadium
City	St. Louis, Missouri
Managers	Casey Stengel (NYY) Walter Alston (BKN)
Attendance	30,693
First pitch	None
Television	NBC
TV announcers	Mel Allen and Al Helfer
Radio	NBC
Radio announcers	Bob Neal and Harry Caray

The 1957 Major League Baseball All-Star Game was the 24th playing of the midseason exhibition baseball game between the all-stars of the American League (AL) and National League (NL), the two leagues comprising Major League Baseball. The game was held on July 9, 1957, at Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Missouri, the home of the St. Louis Cardinals of the National League. The game was marked by controversy surrounding Cincinnati Reds fans stuffing the ballot box and electing all but one of their starting position players to the game. The game resulted in the American League defeating the National League 6–5.

Game summary

Six runs were scored in the final inning, three by each team, for an exciting ending as the American League eked out a 6-5 victory.

The game's scoring began in the second inning with a Mickey Mantle single, Ted Williams walk and Vic Wertz base hit, followed by walks to Yogi Berra and Harvey Kuenn that put the AL on top, 2-0. The score remained that way until the sixth, when a Moose Skowron double and Berra single made it 3-0.

Scoring twice in the seventh, the NL closed the gap with a two-run double by Gus Bell, pinch-hitting for Frank Robinson. In the ninth, the AL appeared to seal the victory with a two-run double by Al Kaline and RBI double by Minnie Miñoso for a 6-2 advantage.

Stan Musial walked and Willie Mays tripled to begin the bottom of the ninth. After Ernie Banks delivered a run-scoring single, with its lead trimmed to 6-5, the AL brought in Bob Grim to face pinch-hitter Gil Hodges, who lined out to left field to end the game.

Cincinnati voting controversy

When fan voting to determine the game's starters was completed, seven Cincinnati Redlegs players (Ed Bailey, Johnny Temple, Roy McMillan, Don Hoak, Frank Robinson, Gus Bell and Wally Post) had been elected to start in the All-Star Game; the only non-Redleg elected to start for the National League was St. Louis Cardinal first baseman Stan Musial. Most baseball observers agreed that while the Redlegs were known to be a great offensive team with many outstanding position players, they did not deserve seven starters in the All-Star Game.

An investigation launched by Commissioner Ford Frick found that over half of the ballots cast came from Cincinnati, with the Cincinnati Enquirer printing up pre-marked ballots and distributing them with the Sunday edition of the newspaper to make it easy for Redlegs fans to vote often for their favorite players, while stories emerged of bars in Cincinnati refusing to serve alcohol to customers until they filled out a ballot.

Frick appointed Willie Mays of the New York Giants and Hank Aaron of the Milwaukee Braves to substitute for Bell and Post, and to strip the fans of their voting rights; Bell was kept as a reserve, while Post was injured and would have been unable to play in any event. Managers, players, and coaches picked the entire team until 1970, when the vote returned to the fans, and to avoid a repeat of this incident, MLB officials evenly distributed the 26 million ballots to 75,000 retail outlets and 150 minor and major league stadiums, while a special panel was also created to review the voting.

Rosters

Players in italics have since been inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Game

Umpires

Starting lineups

Game summary

Footnotes and references

External links

• Baseball Almanac