The Major League Baseball All-Star Game is coming back to Cincinnati after a 25 hiatus after an announcement made on Wednesday by Commissioner Bud Selig in the "Queen City."
Great American Ballpark will be the home to its first ever Midsummer Classic, but it will mark the fifth time that a Reds' ballpark has hosted the event. The first came back in 1938 at Crosley Field and the last in 1988 at Riverfront Stadium.
The gap between All-Star Games was one of the longest in baseball. The New York Mets currently hold the longest period of time between hosting an All-Star Game, but will end a 49 year drought by hosting this year's festivities. Only the Marlins and Rays have yet to host an All-Star Game, while the Nationals haven't held one since 1982 when the franchise was in Montreal.
In 1970, Riverfront was the host to one of the most iconic and controversial plays in All-Star history. In that game the National League won in the 12th inning thanks to the efforts of Reds' Pete Rose. Rose scored from second on a single by Jim Hickman and Rose barreled into AL Catcher Ray Fosse to score the winning run. On the play Fosse would separate his shoulder drawing criticism that Rose's play was unfit for an exhibition game.
Owner Bob Castellini can now cross this off his to-do list and along side Selig, believes that this could provide great profit to the city as well as a chance to showcase the city to out of region fans.
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