The MLB All-Star Game is, thankfully, no longer a game with any real meaning. The 2018 All-Star Game at Nationals Park will have no bearing on who hosts the World Series this fall, as in 2017 the rule that home-field advantage in the Fall Classic would be determined by the winner of the All-Star Game was mercifully scrapped.
That rule had been in place since 2003, and it was almost universally hated. In 2017, the rule finally went to home-field advantage being assigned to whichever team had the better regular season record. Before 2003, it was simply an alternating pattern between the American League and National League.
Now, the incentive to win the game is purely monetary, and it isn't a significant amount of money. The real reward of playing in the All-Star Game is getting to play alongside the best of the best, to phrase it like an after-school special.
MLB finally deciding that the All-Star Games don't have to have stakes may have come a bit too late, and even though it comes at the cost of some intrigue in watching the game, it does make people stop talking about how the All-Star Game shouldn't determine home-field advantage. That alone validates the decision.
