I may be a bit biased but I think I could fairly easily make the argument that of all the major sports, baseball has the best All-Star Game. It’s an event that celebrates the very best in the game and doesn’t sacrifice on the quality of play.
It also makes sure to represent every team in the league and while the local Colorado club hasn’t had much team success over the years, they have almost always had a superstar or two giving them quite the history The Midsummer Classic.
My name is Drew Creasman and this is the History of the Colorado Rockies in the All-Star Game.
On July 13, 1993, at Camden Yards in Baltimore Maryland, Andres Galarraga became the first player in MLB history to wear a Rockies jersey in an All-Star Game. He went 0-for-1 in the game but got plenty of hits that season, winning the first of 11 batting titles for the franchise by batting .370.
Dante Bichette recorded the Rockies first hit at the event, notching a single in his only plate appearance in 1994.
The following season was one of firsts as 1995 saw the team make the postseason for the first time and send more than one player to the All-Star Game for the first time. Vinny Castilla joined Bichette who made it for a second straight year. They went a combined 0-for-3.
1996 saw Bichette return for the third year in a row this time accompanied by Eric Young Sr. and Ellis Burks who was one of the best players in the league that year, putting up 7.9 Wins Above Replacement. A double from Bichette and a triple from Burks gave the club their first pair of extra-base hits at the ASG.
Of course, 1997 was the year of Larry Walker in all ways. He would go on to win the National League MVP award but perhaps most famously would flip his batting helmet around and take a pitch from Randy Johnson out of the right-handed batters box following one that went sailing behind his head. Galarraga also made his return to the game after a three-year absence.
Multiple Blake Street Bombers would appear at the All-Star game for the final time in 1998 when Castilla, Walker, and Bichette represented the club which was apt since it took place at Coors Field in Denver but unfortunate because they went a combined 0-for-5.
Walker went again in 1999 before a new era began to sweep in. An odd year-2000 campaign saw Jeffrey Hammonds and Jeff Cirrilo join Todd Helton as the Rockies reps.
2001 was the only year in which Walker and Helton, the two best players in franchise history, appeared together in the game. Mike Hampton, believe it or not, actually became the first Rockies pitcher ever selected that year as well. Once again the hitters didn’t do much. Hampton pitched an inning with a hit and an unearned run.
As the team’s lone representative in 2002, Helton finally got his first hit and RBI in the game, driving in Jimmy Rollins in the third with a single up the middle against Colorado-native Roy Halladay.
Despite being stuck in the mire, the Rockies had three more players in the All-Star Game in 2003 as Helton took Shawn Chacon and Preston Wilson along for the ride this time. Both Wilson and Helton got hits, Chacon did not end up appearing in the game.
The Toddfather was the only Rockie to go in 2004 and you might’ve missed it since he just went 0-for-1 and might rather have gone fishing.
Despite being selected to the game three straight years from 2005-2007, reliever Brian Fuentes only pitched an inning in 2006, getting a strikeout in a clean frame. He was a “DNP” in the other two games.
Matt Holliday was also there in ‘06 and ‘07, going 0-for 5 in total but got his first hit and finally the first home run for the Rockies in the Midsummer Classic in 2008.
Aaron Cook also made a well deserved trip to the extravaganza and for the first time in history, a Rockie got to pitch multiple innings, scattering 4 hits across three innings without allowing a run; a very Cook-like line.
In 2009, the best regular season in franchise history, it was back to Rockies pitchers not actually getting to pitch in the contest with Jason Marquis doing the honors this time. Brad Hawpe went 0-for-2.
Maybe the most memorable moment in Rockies All-Star Game History took place in 2010 when Ubaldo Jimenez toed the rubber to begin the game for the National League, throwing two scoreless innings.
Troy Tulowitzki was also there but did not play, though he would go 1-for-2 the following season. Further signifying the transition into a new era, Carlos Gonzlalez was the lone rep in 2012, going 0-for-2.
For the second time in their history, the Rockies sent three players to the game despite finishing with a losing record in 2013. Michael Cuddyer joined Tulo and CarGo and the trio went 0-for-5 with a walk.
Charlie Blackmon made his debut in the game in 2014 and Tulowitzki recorded his second All-Star Game hit.
In 2015, Tulowitzki was accompanied by first-timers DJ LeMahieu and Nolan Arenado. They went 0-for-4.
CarGo got his first and only hit at the game in 2016 while Arenado went 0-for-3 but the Gold Glove King became the first Rockie ever with a multi-hit-All-Star-Game when he went 2-for-2 in 2017.
It was also the first time the franchise had four players in the game, and rightfully so with Blackmon, LeMahieu, and reliever Greg Holland all more than deserving. Holland also became the first pitching in team history to strike out multiple batters in the game, getting two of them.
Arenado and Blackmon returned in 2018 while Trevor Story made his first appearance, hitting just the second Rockies All-Star Homer ever.
From a wide-angle view 2019 was one of the worst, certainly one of the most disappointing seasons in franchise history, but it is also only the second time four of their players got no break with Arenado, Blackmon, Story and David Dahl all going.
In 2021, barely at a point when fans could be back in the stadium after the pandemic canceled the game altogether in 2020, the festivities came back to Denver. And for the first time ever, the Rockies only representative in the game was a starting pitcher; German Marquez.
Marquee showed well of himself, pitching a clean inning with a strikeout.
Last year C.J. Cron went 0-for-1 as the only member of the Rockies in the game and this year, for the first time in their history, Colorado will have a catcher in the game as Elias Diaz is set to be included.
All told, the Colorado Rockies have had quite the cast of characters who earned their way to the Midsummer Classic but have also yet to make much of a mark on the game in their 30 year history.
Will this be the year that the most important play in the best All-Star Game in sports comes down to the Colorado player? You never know.
