Welcome to The Opener, where every weekday morning you’ll get a fresh, topical column to start your day from one of SI.com’s MLB writers.
DENVER — Shohei Ohtani played two positions on Tuesday. The way the All-Star Game is going, next year he may have to play nine.
Fourteen players opted out of participating in this year’s Midsummer Classic, second-most of all time. (There were 16 in 2011; the next year, the collective-bargaining agreement made participation largely mandatory.) The league’s showcase event should be a who’s who of the game; instead, at times, it was more of a who’s that.