1958 All-Star Game
After several years of exciting, down to the wire, nine and extra-inning baseball, the 1958 game wasn't exactly the same caliber as its predecessors. It wasn't even close. This was the first All-Star Game to pass without an extra-base hit. In fact, there were only thirteen hits: nine by the American League and four by the National. The National League went down in order in five of the last six innings with the only man reaching base, doing so on an error. Starter Bob Turley allowed three runs and three hits in 1 2/3 innings. The American League had scored in the second on a RBI single by Nelson Fox, cutting the National League lead to 3-2. Then the American League managed single runs off of pitcher Bob Friend in the fifth and scored the winning run in the sixth on Frank Malzone's single, an error by Pirates third baseman Frank Thomas and a single by Gil McDougald. The American League had won two in a row and three out of the last four, but the taste of victory remained bittersweet after a game that was so mediocre and uneventful.
|
