On paper, the All-Star Game means a lot more now than it used to; since 2003, the winning league gets home field advantage in the World Series.  But, as the glut of no-shows shows, the All-Star Game ain't played on paper.

Back when it didn't mean anything on paper, the All Star Game meant a lot to the game of baseball. Here's one example, from 1941, which I came across while looking back at the bygone tradition of Fourth of July doubleheaders.

According to a story by Shirley Povich of the Washington Post printed in July 1941, or just before the All-Star break that year, Washington Senators Manager Bucky Harris "changed his pitching plans" so that a Nats player would be prepared for the biggest single game of the year.

Senators pitching ace Sid Hudson was scheduled to start a game in Boston in Washington's last series before the All-Star Game.

But Harris kept Hudson off the mound that day, and all but bragged to the press that the scratch was necessary so that he could keep a promise to Del Baker, then manager of the reigning American League champs the Detroit Tigers and therefore skippering the AL squad in that year's interleague showcase.

Seems Harris told his rival's manager that he'd have Hudson ready to start the big game if necessary.

“I promised Del Baker that I’d have Hudson rested and fresh for him on Tuesday against the National League," Harris told Povich, "and  I’m not going back on my word.”

Can you imagine what would happen to a manager nowadays who made a move in the best interests of baseball but not his own team?

As it was, Baker started Bob Feller, who gave up just one hit and struck out four over three innings, the maximum stay for a pitcher in an All-Star game.  Hudson got in the game in the seventh inning, but was yanked after giving up two runs on three hits and a walk.

The AL prevailed anyway, 7-5, thanks to a Ted Williams' three-run homer in the bottom of the ninth.

The clip of Williams' game-winner, showing the 22-year-old Williams, about a year before he and Feller took a sabbatical from the American Pastime and went off to war, clapping and skipping around the bases like a little boy, is enough to make anybody love baseball.

Nowadays, it would be called a walk-off three-run home run. But in 1941, it was just a home run.

Everything used to be better, see?

2500 Block Georgia Ave, NW.  © 2011 Matt Dunn

Everything In Its Right Place: In retrospect, the idea that one of the biggest rock bands in the world would want to do a literature drop at a random street corner in Brightwood Park should have seemed off to begin with. But that didn't stop people from getting excited about the prospect that Radiohead's The Universal Sigh would be distributed, as the band's website promised, near 8th and Jefferson streets NW—a corner where the only landmark is a church and some rowhomes. Turns out the band actually meant 8th and Jefferson SW, near the Hirshhorn Gallery. Moral of the story, which American military planners circa 1812 might have done well to remember: Brits can't handle quadrants. -1

Next Stops, Tysons: For the most part, it's fairly easy to figure out where a Metro station is based on its name (though we're still not sure how Howard University got put in the Shaw station name instead of the U Street one). The Silver Line may be destined to break that pattern. Fairfax County officials have proposed starting the name of four of the nine stations in their jurisdiction with "Tysons," while two would be called "Reston" and two "Herndon." Of course, since the nation's willingness to put any money in actual infrastructure dwindles each day, we're not sure the Silver Line will ever actually open—so maybe this won't really be a problem. -2

Raise Taxes, Please: The survey Mayor Vince Gray's administration announced about the budget, a few weeks before the budget was due to be released, clearly didn't seem to be a serious attempt at gauging public interest; if it were, it might have come out a little sooner. But the results are interesting, nonetheless—respondents overwhelmingly want the government to consider raising taxes. Still not too late to add a new marginal interest rate on the top before Friday, Mr. Mayor! +1

Buy Me Some Prozac and Cracker Jack: And now, time for yet another installment of meaningless national rankings featuring the District! Today's episode: "Most Depressed Baseball Cities." A study compiled by some website you've never heard of ranks D.C. at the top—which is to say, the most depressed baseball city in the country. (Which, given there's only one Major League Baseball team outside the U.S., means in the world.) A complicated and, no doubt, highly scientific methodology ranked the cities based on psychiatrists and divorce lawyers per capita, drinking rates, suicide rates, and number of days per baseball team spent out of contention for the pennant. So the result was really no surprise; any ranking that measures a) lawyers and b) baseball losses is likely to put D.C. at the top. -1

Yesterday's Needle rating: 66 Today's score: -3 Today's Needle rating: 63

Maury Wills Field,  2500 Georgia Ave, NW.  March 24th.    © 2011 Matt Dunn

Nationals Stadium, June 8

Does this mean that Loza promised someone taxi cab regulation in exchange for money after he knew the regulation was going to be approved regardless of his influence? If so, that's brilliant and appalling. Then again, Graham could be lying his head off. Note to bribe-easy pols, we need more cabs with fewer regulations. Why? Because people need jobs and I NEED RIDES AND NOT THE KIND AT THE CARNIVAL.

The Trans-Siberian Orchestra's remaining fans are over at our new blog, the Arts Desk, sulking and waiting for an apology. I made fun of their nuts, you see, and they're not happy. Also, I am not going to apologize.

For all you bicyclists who can't seem to stop at red lights (urm, that's me as well, so don't shit your lycra), a harrowing story:

After two hours of deliberation, a jury Tuesday found a Denver Police officer not guilty of using excessive force by slamming a man's face into the ground and breaking his teeth, even though the event was caught on videotape.

Heaney, who was riding his bike past Coors Field on his way to see his mother in a hospice, claimed [Officer] Cordova and other undercover police officers pulled him off his bike, kicked, punched and beat him, then slammed his face into the ground, breaking two front teeth. He says all this happened while he was on his stomach about to be handcuffed.

Whole thing here. H/t to Radley Balko.

Tejada lied about buying HGH. But he stated that he had misgivings about using the performance enhancer and threw out the drugs. Prosecutors don't have enough evidence showing that he actually used the drug. So he just lied about buying them.

The Post writes:

"Although not charged with taking performance-enhancing drugs or lying about using them, Tejada nevertheless becomes the latest prominent major leaguer to become ensnared in the steroids scandal hammering baseball."

One interesting note, Tejada's attorney is Mark Tuohey. He's investigated the D.C. Police Department with very mixed results. He's done some lobbying for then-Chief Charles Ramsey. And was a huge baseball booster.

As luck would have it, the W.T. Woodson grad and Auburn University star signed a contract with the Texas Rangers and left the Cape to mere hours before game time to start his pro career.

But while I was at the game and talking with locals about the Kettleers' history, more than one fan mentioned that Bill Richardson, the current New Mexico governor and burgeoning scandal magnet, was on the team in the 1960s.

Richardson, I was told, was so good that he'd been drafted by the Kansas City Athletics.

I'm no scout, and had never seen Richardson, who I was told still hangs out in Cotuit in the summer and catches Kettleers games, perform in anything other than street clothes. But I can't say the guy ever struck me as pro athlete material.

But I Googled him when I got home and found references to Richardson's being picked by the A's and being headed for the Majors before injuries derailed his baseball dreams and sent him into a political career.

In one profile about his days playing with Cotuit, Richardson uses the old "boast-disguised-as-self-deprecation" tool that all good politicians have at the ready, treating the interviewer for a small New England publication to a remembrance of the time that future New York Yankees great Thurman Munson jacked a monster home run off him during a Cape Cod League game.

Well, Richardson's been in the headlines lately for an investigation into allegedly peddling his influence for campaign contributions.

And if nothing else comes out of the inquiry, my lack of faith in the politico's athletic potential has already been confirmed: Richardson, amid the blood-in-the-water convergence of media types since he withdrew his name from consideration for a cabinet post in the Obama administration, has been forced to admit that the baseball draft portion of his bio is phony.

An investigation into Richardson's baseball claims by the Albuquerque Journal uncovered that the only source for all the A's stories was the governor himself.

When confronted with the fact that no evidence to confirm his oft-told tale exists, Richardson gave as pathetic a confession as possible: "After being notified of the situation and after researching the matter," he said, "I came to the conclusion that I was not drafted by the A's."

(Munson died in a plane crash in 1979, so he isn't around to say Richardson never really served him a gopher ball all those years ago on the Cape. Pity.)

Briefly back to Cotuit guys who really were drafted by Major League teams: After leaving the Kettleers in July, Bianucci hit .316 in 31 games with a Rangers rookie league affiliate in Spokane, Wash.

He keeps that up, and he'll never be a governor.