I'm going to risk boring you as I air out my pet peeve in baseball.

No, not Creeping LaRussaism, not today, anyway. At least Creeping LaRussaism involves thought, however convoluted. You've got to work really hard to screw up how a baseball game is run as badly as the Cardinals' skipper has. He honestly thinks he has come up with a better way to approach victory. He's sincere; I'll give him that. He thinks running in seven pitchers from the seventh inning on of a one-run game is the way to go. What can I say?

No, what I'm venting about today is the idiotic head-first slide.

I choose this occasion because tonight David Ortiz is supposed to return to the Red Sox lineup after missing the last four games. And why was Big Papi hors de combat to begin with? It's because he injured his right shoulder last Friday evening attempting (fruitlessly) to stretch a single into a double with a foolish earth-shattering belly-flop against the White Sox; that's why.

I hope I make myself clear enough: head-first sliding is ALWAYS a)unnecessary b) dangerous and c) counter-productive. Every organization should do everything in its power to discourage its players from employing the tactic. I'm talking about fining, if that's the only way to convince players not to do it.

By far the dumbest place to slide head first is home plate. The catcher has armor; the baserunner doesn't. 'Nuff said. But there is nothing a head-firster can accomplish at any time a conventional slider (with the proper technique) can't. I'll guarantee you neither Ty Cobb nor the Great DiMaggio ever slid head first.

The second dumbest place to slide head first is first base. In fact, the only reason to slide at first base at all is to avoid a tag. After watching far too many Mike Greenwell head-first slides into first, I was moved a few years back to contact the physics department at MIT. I was put in touch with a baseball-loving physicist who explained to me that sliding head first doesn't get you there any faster. In fact, it slows you down.

Now if the first base coach can convey to you that a tag is in the offing, then, hell yes, get down. But if you go head first, don't think it will get you there quicker than if you had gone feet first. It won't.

Why does everyone slide head first these days? They do so because everyone else does it. I'm wondering if proper sliding is even taught any more.

Two people are responsible for this plague. The first was Pepper Martin, "The Wild Horse of the Osage," who captivated America with a scintillating performance in the 1931 World Series, hitting .500 and regaling spectators with head-first slides. But the practice was not widespread (Martin was regarded as something of a nut job), and it was out of baseball until Pete Rose showed up in 1963.

You might know it would take a narcissistic showboat to revive a counter-productive practice. Oh, look at Pete run to first base on a walk. Oh, look at Pete sprint around the bases after hitting a homer. And, oh, look at Pete slide head first everywhere. What hustle! What a competitor!

What crap.

There was a lot to like about Pete Rose's game, but head-first sliding was a lot of nonsense, and now it is his ultimate legacy to the game. Asinine head-first sliding has accounted for an untold amount of injuries. Remember Manny injuring himself sliding head first into the plate that night in Seattle? That was completely avoidable.

And, yes, I know that Rickey Henderson was a head-first slider for his entire career. I'm here to tell you that he would have been just as safe on every one of those stolen bases had he gone feet first. Yes, I know Dave Roberts went in head-first on that fateful October evening in 2004. Same goes for him. Jeter wouldn't have gotten the tag down any quicker if he were trying to beat a foot instead of a hand.

Yes, I realize people used to get hurt sliding into bases the old-fashioned way, usually, we were told, when "their spikes got caught in the bag." Well, they don't wear metal spikes now. There is far less likelihood of someone getting hurt the old-fashioned way if they now slid the old-fashioned way.

But no one is listening. And so players will continue to jam shoulders, get hands and fingers broken, and just plain mess themselves up sliding head first, because they honestly don't know any better. And a lot of them will be out at first because they took more time getting there on their stomach than if they had simply kept those legs churning.

As far as I'm concerned, if the Red Sox lose another player to an injury caused by a needless head-first slide it's their own fault. They should know better by now: head-first sliding is a menace.

I'm telling you all so in advance.

You say you're a baseball fan? OK, if you're heading to New York City any time soon, have I got a deal for you.

You need to take yourself (and your baseball-loving offspring) to the Museum of the City of New York at 5th Avenue and 103d Street. You need to see an exhibit titled "The Glory Days: New York Baseball from 1947-57." (Click here for hours of operation and admission fees)

This was the true Golden Era of major league baseball in New York. During those 11 seasons, there was a World Series involving one of the three New York teams every year but one (1948, which featured the Indians and our Boston Braves). There were so-called "Subway Series" involving two New York teams in 1947, 1949, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1955, and 1956.

The Yankees were at the height of their imperial glory, winning it all in 1947, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, and 1956. They remain the only team to have won five consecutive World Series. It was sometime in this era when it was noted that "rooting for the Yankees is like rooting for General Motors."

No one ever said that about the Giants, although there once was a time when they were the favored team of the New York elite. John McGraw's Giants were the first face of New York baseball. The Yankees were, in fact, humble tenants of the Giants in the Polo Grounds until they constructed Yankee Stadium in time for the 1923 season.

And surely no one ever said that about the Dodgers, who fully embraced their "outsider" status, vis a vis the haughty citizens of Manhattan. The Dodgers were more like the local high school team than the Brooklyn National League representative. Almost every player lived in someone's neighborhood. Ebbets Field itself was like a second (albeit battered and disheveled) summer home. And it was in everyone's DNA to hate the Giants. No one wasted any energy hating the Yankees until the World Series. The 22 games with the Giants were the mini-Armageddons.

You will see the predictable uniforms, bats, cleats, hats, gloves, etc. of the predictable icons. You will see the predictable memorabilia. They're all fine. An actual Willie Mays glove should make those little hairs at the base of your neck stand at attention. But those weren't the big things for me.

You will hear, for example, not just the well-known Russ Hodges call of Bobby Thomson's legendary home run, but also the seldom-heard Red Barber call of that same blow. It's hard to imagine two more contrasting approaches to the same situation.

Even better is a glorious opportunity to see a famous World Series incident --- Billy Martin's game-saving catch of a wind-blown Jackie Robinson pop fly in Game 7 of the 1952 Series --- and Mel Allen's complete on-air call of the lengthy at-bat.

I would likewise put as priceless the excerpts from various "Ed Sullivan Shows" in which the famed host, a huge baseball fan, interviews the likes of Sal Maglie, Allie Reynolds, Eddie Stanky, Phil Rizzuto and a bow-tied Bobby Thomson. I also loved substitute host Phil ("Sergeant Bilko") Silvers's interview with Mickey Mantle.

But I'm not sure even these wonderful video snippets top the astonishing correspondence on display. Here, for example, we have Pee Wee Reese writing Dodgers general manager Buzzy Bavasi following the 1951 season detailing why he should be given a raise to $30,000. And we have Buzzy's reply, which wonders aloud what happened to Pee Wee during the final seven weeks of the season. No 30 grand for you, Pee Wee.

There is, of course, lots on Jackie Robinson. I mean, duh.

You need to see this. Your kids need to see this. It runs, fortunately, until Dec. 31. Make plans now.

Hold all calls. We have a winner. Jim Leyland is my favorite baseball manager.

I should have known he'd manage a modern All-Star Game with some common sense. God bless him for allowing Dan Haren and Josh Beckett to pitch two innings apiece. God bless him for having four pitchers left. We could have gone 16, 18, 25 innings... whatever it took.

And God bless him for leaving himself with a position player who didn't belong in the game at all. Yes, Michael Young has been an amazingly unsung player for several years. And, yes, he did win the 2006 game with a clutch ninth-inning triple. But he was not All-Star worthy in 2007.

Meanwhile, we have yet another case of Tony Being Tony (TBT). This TBT moment was Mr. LaRussa's curious decision to keep Albert Pujols safe and sound for the senior prom. Aaron Rowand is a good player. BUT HE'S NOT ALBERT PUJOLS!!! I think you know where I'm going with this.

All in all, it wasn't a bad All-Star Game, as modern All-Star Games go, although I am wondering what Pete Rose and Ray Fosse thought of A-Rod's lady-like attempt to score on that base hit. Of course, Fox had to tease us with an 8 p.m. airtime for a game that wasn't begun until damn near 9 p.m. Eastern. But that's TV. What else is new? So much for generating young fans east of the Mississippi.

Can't wait 'til Jim Leyland returns to Boston (ALDS? ALCS?). I'm buying, believe you me.

Start with this: the Major League Baseball All-Star Game will never be what it once was. It can never mean what it once meant. That time has come and gone.

But it can sure be a lot better than it is.

The All-Star Game was once one of the top five sporting events in America, no question. Even played in broad daylight and available to the general population either on radio or in print the following day, the All-Star Game held America in its grip. The issue was National League vs. American League, and people cared. Do fans today have any idea that there was no such thing as interleague trading until the early ‘60s? It was a mighty big deal to cross from one league to the other. You only did it when you were young or old.

When Chicago Tribune sports editor Arch Ward conceived of a baseball All-Star Game to be played in conjunction with the 1933 Chicago World's Fair, there was baseball and there was everything else as far as team sports were concerned in this country. The idea of assembling all of baseball's stars on one field had an enormous appeal. That Babe Ruth hit the first home run was only fitting.

The game acquired an immediate cachet in its second year when Carl Hubbell fanned Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Al Simmons and Joe Cronin -- five Hall of Famers to be -- in succession. By 1941, when Ted Williams hit a two-out, three-run game-winning homer in Detroit off Chicago Cubs righthander Claude Passeau, the game had taken hold as a major, major event on the American sports calendar.

It remained so right into the ‘70s. In that pre-cable, pre-lotsastuff era, ratings remained high. Who didn't see Pete Rose run over Ray Fosse to decide the 1970 game? And when Reggie Jackson hit that majestic homer off the light tower a year later (again in Detroit) you'd swear that the blast off Dock Ellis had been witnessed by every living American.

But we don't live in that world any longer. For many reasons, fewer people build that second Tuesday in July around the baseball All-Star Game. So be it. They shouldn't. The game has been ruined.

The game took on a new, lesser light in the ‘80s, when suddenly it turned into grammar school and everyone needed a ribbon to say you had been in attendance. For the first four decades of its existence, managers managed the All-Star Game to win. Starting pitchers routinely worked three innings. Starting position players might play the full game. It was simply understood that being selected didn't necessarily mean you were going to play. Everyone seemed fine with that. After all, the idea was to beat the $*@*!^# out of those blankety-blanks from that other (inferior) league.

There was once great intrigue and mystery attached to the "other" league. Now in this era of ESPN, TBS and major league TV packages anyone with the means to do so can see all the baseball he or she wants. And then there is interleague play. It's simply no big deal to see the stars of the "other" league when they were in your town two weeks earlier, or readily available on TV.

As for the All-Star Game itself, managers simply did what they had to do. In 1967 Catfish Hunter worked the final five innings of a 15-inning 2-1 National League victory. There were other pitchers available since manager Hank Bauer only used five. Thirty-five years later the game ended in a tie when managers Joe Torre and Bob Brenly ran out of pitchers. How did we arrive at such a ludicrous juncture?

It's no secret, actually. We arrived there because back in the ‘80s managers began using all of their pitchers. Now the most anyone goes is two, and then it's one inning, one inning, one inning, one inning and so on. You keep doing that, and that's how you run out of pitchers in an 11-inning game. In my mind, you deserve what you get.

As far as position players are concerned, you're very fortunate to get three at-bats. Everybody's got to play, you know. I keep thinking about the night in 1987 when my wife and I were sitting in White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf's box listening to him chat with George Steinbrenner. The Boss didn't know that I was a moonlighting writer from Boston, and Reinsdorf, who did know, hadn't told him. So on and on The Boss went about how outraged he was that Dave Winfield had played the entire All-Star Game, all 12 innings of it, earlier that week. No one has to worry about someone playing 12 innings in this day and age.

It's hard to believe that Ted Williams went 4-for-4 with four runs scored and five ribbies in the 12-0 AL victory in 1946. Or even that Yaz went 4-for-6 in 1970. Nobody will ever have that opportunity again.

Now we have this massive overreaction to the 2002 tie game fiasco, with the league whose All-Star team wins the game being awarded home field advantage in the World Series. This is beyond dumb, on many levels.

It might actually have made sense 40, 50 or 60 years ago, when managers played serious games. But where is the rationale when you're not remotely playing a proper game, when you're making subs just to make subs to keep everyone happy? How does that make any sense?

If Bud Selig really wanted this game to have meaning, he would do the following:

1. Eliminate the requirement that every team be represented. The NBA realized the folly of this 30 years ago.

2. Reduce the rosters from 32 to 26, which is one more than the norm. This would allow for an extra pitcher.

3. Instruct managers to substitute as they see fit, paying no attention to how many players get to play.

4. Make it clear that all pitchers are capable of working at least two innings apiece.

5. Institute the DH. If there is one time a DH is not only advisable, but necessary, it is the All-Star Game.

6. I am dead serious about this one. Identify a pitcher on each team who shall be known as the Designated Finisher. He would understand that under no circumstances would he be used in the first nine innings, but that if he were to be used in the 10th or beyond he would be finishing the game, no matter how long it goes. He would be baseball's answer to the Designated Driver. I see no other way to ensure that we have no more tie All-Star games because "we ran out of pitchers."

Do all this, and then we might have ourselves an All-Star Game worth caring about.

This will fix the game, but it will not force America to care as much about the 2007 game as the American sports fan did in 1937, ‘57 or ‘77. That's not going to happen.

I can live with that. But I have a hard time living with the foolish game baseball has now created.

To some, perhaps even most, the definition of a great baseball game must include a game-winning homer, a Top 10 highlight catch, somebody whiffing 18 people, or some such dramatics.

We had only one of those at Fenway last night --- Marlon Byrd's diving robbery of Mike Lowell's third-inning bid for an RBI base hit --- but this was a great baseball game for anyone even remotely attuned to the game's infinite subtleties and quirks. So believe anyone who told you that he or she had been witness to a great game of baseball at Fenway on Monday, July 2, 2007.

1. There was the entire Jacoby Ellsbury saga. Anyone in attendance Monday evening saw the young man from Oregon get his second infield hit; his first hit to the outfield; his first major league stolen base; and, best of all, his first successful major league foray from second base to home plate on a wild pitch. I wonder if this was indeed a Red Sox first?

It was Ellsbury's first, but, presumably, not his last what I call "Omigod moment" of his major league career. When he saw the ball bounce oddly and wildly up to the left of Rangers' catcher Gerald Laird, he knew exactly what to do. When the rest of us saw him rounding third with a full head of steam we all went, "Omigod! He's coming home!" And it wasn't even close.

We had all heard that the kid could run, but it is already evident he is in the elite speed category. Colleague Nick Cafardo firmly believes that one of the reasons he was brought up was to inject some life in a somewhat listless team wheezing to the All-Star break. If that's the case, it's working.

The question is, "What now?" Coco Crisp is nearing a return, which probably means Ellsbury can point the car south on I-95. Oh, if he were only a shortstop. But we will see him again, and soon, I reckon.

2. On a night when J.D. Drew lost a nine-game hitting streak with an 0-for-2, he showed that he is getting back in his groove by drawing four 3-2 counts while walking three times. That's who he was supposed to be.

3. Dustin Pedroia continues to excite. The kid had an opposite-field RBI double. He also had two vicious rocket line-drive outs, including a liner back to the box luckily speared by Willie Eyre, who came very close to having a "Glad-I-wore-my-cup" episode. Don't make any more of this comparison than I'm citing here, but Pedroia reminds me of the early Nomah with his mighty cuts. This kid does not get cheated.

4. Ron Washington turns back the clock on us.

My friend James Isaacs and I marveled as manager Washington allowed Mr. Eyre to stay out there and just keep throwing. Eyre relieved starter Brandon McCarthy with two away in the fourth. He threw the wild pitch that sent Ellsbury in motion, although the run was charged to McCarthy. Now when a modern manager makes a change like that it normally signals a parade of hurlers.

Not this time. Eyre came back out in the fifth. And sixth. And seventh. His pitch count mounted into the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s and, finally --- amazingly --- into the 80s. The pitch he threw to retire Julio Lugo with the bases loaded in the seventh was his 83rd!

You may go to a 100 major leagues games between now and the end of the World Series, and I bet you right now that in none of them will a so-called middle reliever get to throw 83 pitches. Now it could be that Washington does this all the time and no one told me. I do know I'll be paying attention to Texas box scores from now on.

By the way, the three Texas pitchers (Joaquin Beloit worked the eighth and fanned the side) combined to throw 181 pitches. I'm surprised the game only took 3:18.

5. Explain fans to me. Kason Gabbard takes a no-no into the fifth. He loses it on a routine single through the third base/shortstop hole by Laird. The (apparently) appreciative crowd gives him a well-deserved prolonged ovation. The next batter is Brad Wilkerson and he launches a three-run bomb into the Texas pen. Now I'm hearing boos, and I mean more than just a few. One batter later! Where do these people come from? And, yes, he gets a nice ovation when Terry Francona lifts him with two outs in the sixth, but I still wonder how anyone could have booed that Wilkerson homer. Am I missing something?

6. The Timlin Chronicles continue. The beleaguered vet relieved Gabbard and retired Victor Diaz on a grounder with Byrd perched on second. He got the first two men in the seventh before Travis Metcalf doubled into the left field corner. Francona brought in Javier Lopez to face Kenny Lofton, who ended the inning with a grounder to third.

It's no secret the Fenway faithful want no more of Mike Timlin. This was perhaps best summed up early Tuesday morning by a woman of my acquaintance who said, "You know how they say stress causes weight gain? Well, my stress is when Mike Timlin comes into the game. That's when I head to the refrigerator."

7. Manny Being Manny, Part Infinity.

Manny hits one to dead center in the third. Manny watches. The ball hits the wall. Manny has to go into third gear to get himself a double, and never mind that Ellsbury would have had a stand-up triple. Manny should have been cruising into second.

Once again under the heading of MBM, I find it amusing that Manny seems gung-ho on being in San Francisco for the All-Star Game the one year in a dozen he doesn't remotely belong in it. Where's the sick Granny or bum knee when we need it? As Shaughnessy always says, you can't make this stuff up.

8. Okajima cruises through a 1-2-3 ninth that includes Rembrandt-like painting with that 87/88 mph heater. But what else is new?

Anyway, it was a superb all-around night of baseball. There was so much to talk about, so much to analyze. I wonder if the beachball-swatting, "Sweet Caroline"-singing patrons among the 36,7878 privileged to be there had any idea what they had just seen.

P.S. As a bonus, Ray Allen threw an Okajima-like fastball on the black for a first pitch. Very impressive.

It is a fact I signed off on trading the fifth pick for a veteran. But I was kinda thinking about someone born after 1980.

On a list of improbable, no-one-of-sound-mind-and-sober-judgment-would-ever-do-such-a-thing acts, trading the fifth pick of the NBA draft in a juicy year chock full of potential All-Stars for a 32-year old shooting guard would have ranked at the bottom. On the other hand, I rather like Big Baby.

Um, Danny, this is not what any of us had in mind. The five for a 27-year old anything of proven substance? Yeah. The five for Pau Gasol? Yeah. But the five for a banged-up 32-year old shooting guard? Waiter, give me a double. No, wait. A triple.

I'm not very happy about losing Delonte West, either. And I was also of the opinion it would be worth one more go-round with Wally. I am truly gobsmacked.

Look, Ray Allen has been a class NBA act. He has been one of the great shooters of his era. He has been an elite player. Note all those "has beens?" He barely played more games than Paul Pierce did last year. And the history of aging shooting guards in the World's Greatest Basketball League is grim. The uncontestable facts are available to anyone with an NBA Guide, let alone anyone with access to a computer. Nobody goes faster in the NBA than shooting guards. This is a highly illogical act.

But it sure is a CYA one. This is an act of desperation by a general manager who, quite obviously, thinks he needs to win yesterday. And if Ray Allen can suit up for 70 games or so the Celtics probably will win 10 or 12 more games. And then Ray Allen will be exponentially closer to retirement.

The second widespread assumption is that this deal was done to placate Paul Pierce, who now does indeed have a veteran to share the scoring load. He won't have to play Big Brother to Jeff Green, Corey Brewer, Yi Jianlian, Brandan Wright or even Mike Conley, Jr. another player who would have made a lot of sense for the Boston Celtics. If so, this is a bad reason. Paul Pierce is not good enough to be regarded as an assistant GM.

And how about this: was Danny fleeced by a 31-year old rookie GM who played his college ball at Emerson?

Elsewhere, I am intrigued by the reaction Joakim Noah got in Chicago, specifically the Chicago Tribune. Columnist Rick Morrissey panned the selection, big-time. He sees Noah as an offensively-challenged guy who's "soft," to boot. He pretty much killed the kid. But NBA columnist Sam Smith loved it. He sees Noah adding to an already impressive arsenal of athleticism, both young (Lual Deng, Tyrus Thomas, etc.) and old (Ben Wallace). He thinks Noah's extraordinary hustle and enthusiasm will fit perfectly with the Bulls’ general scheme of things. He basically thinks that, for the Bulls, getting Noah is too good to be true.

I'm with Sam.

True, Noah enters the NBA with perhaps the absolute all-time ugliest basic shot ever. Period. It's too low and it rotates sideways and it is, well, hideous. Yup, that's the gospel truth.

Doesn't matter. He does other things, winning things. He is not afraid to throw that skinny body around in order to get rebounds. He will be too quick for any power forward to deal with. He will run the floor. And he will be a frightening weakside shot-blocking presence.

Plus...

With Noah in the lineup, Scott Skiles can construct the greatest zone defense the NBA has ever seen. He can have Deng, Thomas, Wallace, Noah and Whomever out there at the same time. Noah could be out front on a 2-3 or even be the point man on a 1-3-1. He will be a unique weapon.

I believe he will make a play or two per game no one else in the league can make. He will be able to influence games while scoring, say, five points or fewer. If they run the way they should, however, he'll score a lot more than 5 ppg. It will be to the Bulls' everlasting shame if they fail to find ways to exploit his unique gifts.

So, yes, I'd have been happy to have him in Green and White. I think the fans would have salivated.

Back to Danny's move. The one good thing that did come out of it was the acquisition of Glen Davis, aka "Big Baby." This may save his you-know-what in the long run.

Big Baby is one of those guys who bothers people because they don't know what he is. Center? Forward? Nose Tackle? Sumo Wrestler? Stop! Can't someone just be a basketball player?

He is a legitimate first-rounder. You must not take the numbers at face value. Each year the draft has graduations. This year everyone knows that after 1 and 2 you draw a line. I would say the next graduation runs from 3 to 14, where who you took depended on need and whim. I'll say it again: Al Thornton was 14, and there is no way there were 13 better players lying around in this draft. I don't know how the pros would pinpoint the next break, but I'd be willing to bet that most people don’t think there was any appreciable difference from 20 to 35. Big Baby is a legit first rounder; that's all I'm saying.

Did you happen to catch those two interesting pieces written by former Penn guard Steven Danley that were published in the New York Times this past week? These were the observations of a savvy basketball junkie who offered his assessment of some players available in the draft. The first one had to do with the idea that all of us, whether in the NBA or just playing 3-on-3 somewhere, divide the other players we know as those people we want to play with and those we don't. He listed Big Baby as the kind if player you want to play with.

He was also very big on Acie Law IV and Alando Tucker. He was not so big on BC Bad Boy Sean Williams, whom he said had just the one very known skill and was useless on offense (I would respectfully disagree). He claimed that when Penn played BC in the 2006 NCAA first round they ignored Williams on offense. But I have seen Williams make a nice banked turnaround, as well as some jump hooks. Anyway, this is supposed to be about Big Baby, who, if he pans out --- I did say "if" --- will be what Tractor Traylor was supposed to be.

The good news is that we still have Big Al. For the time being. As we know, once Danny picks up the phone he is capable of anything.