It’s been more than 30 years since the Midsummer Classic was at Wrigley Field.
Over the weekend, Cubs President of Baseball Operations was interviewed on the Cubs flagship radio station 670 The Score.
In that interview, Kenney said it’s “very realistic” that the Cubs could be awarded the 2027 MLB All-Star Game, presuming the team meets certain MLB requirements:
“The commissioner has basically made it very obvious – fix your security issue, and I’m going to award you an All-Star Game,” Kenney said on Inside the Clubhouse on Saturday.
The Cubs last hosted the All-Star Game in 1990, as shown above. That game was definitely not one to remember. The AL won 2-0, the NL had just two hits, and the game was interrupted for two hours by a tremendous thunderstorm.
There are security issues involved for MLB awarding an All-Star Game, and Kenney went through some of those during the interview:
“We’ve had multiple mayors chase this,” Kenney said. “Mayor Emanuel went to New York with a proposition for the game. We were trying to get it for the finish of the Wrigley project. So we were looking at like 2021, which turned out, because of COVID … wouldn’t have been the (best) year for us. The commissioner made it very clear to then-mayor Emanuel, ‘This is what I need to see around Wrigley Field.’ So every year, there’s a scoring system and unfortunately in New Orleans, we just saw another incident. But even going back to the Stade de France (in 2015) and what has been happening internationally, there’s a scoring system for each ballpark in terms of perimeter security and we are last in baseball.
“The beauty of Wrigley is we play in a neighborhood. That means active streets during the game, 40,000 people inside and a U-Haul truck that could have fertilizer in it rolling right past the gates. That’s no good, and the commissioner made it very clear that’s no good. Those streets need to be closed – not just from the moment the game starts but during the game. Progress was made, and then Rahm left office. Honestly, mayor (Lori) Lightfoot made a lot of progress with the commissioner and a plan and then was not re-elected (in 2023). So we picked up the torch with mayor (Brandon) Johnson, and he’s been making a lot of progress. And I think it’s a very realistic expectation for 2027 based on the conversations I’m aware of that are happening.”
Hopefully, the city and team can get done the things that need to be done before the Cubs and Wrigley Field can be awarded the All-Star Game. It’s not just the game that’s important. There’s also the Home Run Derby and the host city also gets a large FanFest that’s connected to the game.
This year’s All-Star Game will be at Truist Park in Atlanta and next year, it’ll be hosted by the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia.
In addition to the 1990 Midsummer Classic, now 35 years in the past, the Cubs and Wrigley Field hosted it in 1947 and 1962.
Here’s 20 minutes worth of the 1962 All-Star Game, saved in honor of Washington Senators pitcher Dave Stenhouse by his son, former MLB player Mike Stenhouse. Stenhouse was the AL starting pitcher and you’ll see his appearance here. The announcers are Vin Scully and Curt Gowdy. The latter called MLB games for various networks for much of the 1960s and 1970s.
And here’s the entire 1990 All-Star Game at Wrigley: