A look back at the 2014 All-Star Game at Target Field, by the numbers

A decade ago, Major League Baseball’s best and brightest gathered in the Twin Cities, as the All-Star Game was held in Minnesota for the third time. The game was a 5-3 American League victory, thus giving the AL champion home-field advantage in the World Series, an idea that has run its course. One idea that hasn’t? This was the first year MLB had special All-Star Game caps, worn with the players’ regular uniforms; in 2021 they went to complete All-Star Game uniforms, something we will see again this year in Texas.

With 10 years having passed since the Midsummer Classic at Target Field, we figured it was time to look back at some of the stars that shined that night — 81 All-Stars in all, thanks in part to replacements for players who couldn’t play. The 2014 All-Star Game by the numbers:

There were two Hall of Famers in that game, at least so far. Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter made his 14th and final All-Star appearance. Batting leadoff, he lined a double down the right-field line on Adam Wainwright’s second pitch of the game, setting up a three-run first inning for the AL. In the bottom of the third, Jeter blooped a single to right against Alfredo Simón — more on him later. Jeter came out to the field in the top of the fourth, only to be immediately pulled for Alexei Ramírez, drawing an ovation from the crowd.

The other Hall of Famer isn’t actually a Hall of Famer yet, but he will be this weekend. Texas’ Adrián Beltré only was selected an All-Star four times, all after his 30th birthday, between 2010 and ‘14. Beltré entered the game in the sixth inning and drew a four-pitch walk from Francisco Rodríguez in his only plate appearance.

What of Joe Mauer? The Twins first baseman and six-time All-Star, an AL starter at catcher in 2013, was not selected for the 2014 game after landing on the injured list because of an oblique injury earlier in July. But he had a role to play anyway, as MLB had named Mauer the All-Star Game ambassador in April.

Also not an All-Star in 2014: Boston’s David Ortiz, despite having been an All-Star nine of the previous 10 seasons. Ortiz was hitting .255 with 20 homers and 64 RBI at the break, but Baltimore’s Nelson Cruz (.287, 28, 74) was the only DH picked for the team.

There were also two Minnesota high school graduates to pitch in the game, and both factored in the decision. Former Twins righthander Pat Neshek made his first of two All-Star appearances at age 33. He ended up taking the loss, as the St. Louis reliever and Park Center graduate entered in the bottom of the fifth inning with the score tied 3-3. He retired Josh Donaldson on a groundout, but Derek Norris and Ramírez reached on singles, and Mike Trout put the AL ahead for good on an RBI double. Neshek was replaced by Tyler Clippard, who gave up a sacrifice fly to Jose Altuve.

The other Minnesota high school graduate was Twins closer Glen Perkins, selected as an All-Star for the second of three years in a row. The former Stillwater and Gophers lefthander didn’t get to pitch in 2013 at New York’s Citi Field. For the All-Star Game at his home ballpark, he not only got the assignment to pitch the ninth inning, but he got to pitch to his own catcher, as the Twins’ Kurt Suzuki was selected for the game as an injury replacement. Perkins pitched a 1-2-3 ninth, retiring Miguel Montero on a flyout, striking out Josh Harrison and inducing a grounder from Charlie Blackmon to earn a save for finishing a two-run AL victory.

In addition, two other 2014 All-Stars didn’t go to high school in Minnesota but were named as the Twins’ Dick Siebert Award winner for Upper Midwest Player of the Year. Washington righthander Jordan Zimmermann, from Auburndale, Wis., won the award in 2013 but didn’t pitch at Target Field because of injury. Pittsburgh lefthander Tony Watson, from Grimes, Iowa, won the award in 2015, a year after he made his only All-Star appearance.

Four of the players named to the 2014 All-Star Game would, later in their careers, play in the ballpark as members of the Twins. We’ve already mentioned three. Tyler Clippard was selected as an All-Star for the second time in his seven seasons with Washington. Following that year, his big-league path took him to 10 other teams, including the Twins for 26 games in the COVID-shortened 2020 season, before he returned to the Nationals in 2022. Among Clippard’s Twins teammates were Nelson Cruz, who hit 76 home runs in 258 games with the Twins from 2019 to ‘21, and Josh Donaldson, who signed a four-year, $92 million contract with the Twins before the 2020 season, then was traded to the Yankees two years later to help clear the way for Carlos Correa’s arrival.

The fourth? Fernando Rodney, who earned 25 of his 327 career saves for the Twins in 2018 before he was dealt to Oakland. Rodney was selected for the All-Star Game for the second time in 2014, when earned an MLB-best 48 saves for Seattle.

As for past Twins, there were only two in 2014, a year after a whopping eight were selected in the 2013 All-Star Game in New York. We already mentioned Pat Neshek, who wound up pitching with seven big-league teams over 13 seasons. And starting in left field for the NL was Milwaukee’s Carlos Gómez, his second consecutive All-Star selection over his own 13-year career. Colorado’s Justin Morneau was on the ballot for the final NL roster spot but lost out to the Cubs’ Anthony Rizzo; however, he got his Target Field moment by participating in the Home Run Derby.

Of the 81 players listed as an All-Star in 2014, for 14 of them it was their only All-Star selection: Henderson Alvarez, Erick Aybar, Devin Mesoraco, Brandon Moss, Derek Norris, Yasiel Puig, Alexei Ramírez, Tyson Ross, Jeff Samardzija, Kyle Seager, Alfredo Simón, Kurt Suzuki, Koji Uehara and Tony Watson. Some of those names are more familiar than others. Ramírez, for example, was a thorn in the Twins’ side for years as the White Sox shortstop. Puig is still playing, albeit in Mexico; he last appeared in MLB in 2019. Seager played 11 big-league seasons, all with Seattle; his brother Corey Seager was just named as a replacement for the Twins’ Carlos Correa as an AL All-Star for this year’s game.

Samardzija, famously a college wide receiver at Notre Dame, was an interesting case because he was dealt from the Chicago Cubs to Oakland in early July 2014. The righthander wasn’t eligible to pitch for the NL because of the trade, but he was listed on the NL roster and wore a generic “National League” jersey for the game, which he watched from the NL bullpen.

The most obscure of the one-time All-Stars? For pitchers, we’ll go with Alvarez, who replaced the injured Jordan Zimmermann on the roster and didn’t get into the game. The 24-year-old Venezuelan was 6-5 with a 2.63 ERA for Miami at the break in 2014. He finished the season 12-7 with a 2.65 ERA but then made only seven big-league appearances after that; he’s been pitching in Mexico since 2021.

For the position players, Mesoraco was a catcher who played eight big-league seasons, almost entirely with Cincinnati, but in only 468 games thanks largely to injuries. In 2014 he hit .273 with 25 homers with 80 RBI for the Reds; over the next four years he hit .206 with 17 homers and 50 RBI.

This was the genesis of this entire look back: How many All-Stars from 2014 remain in the big leagues today? It turns out there are 16, though that’s including Clayton Kershaw, who is rehabbing at Class AAA and is supposed to make his 2024 debut for the Dodgers soon. The others, in alphabetical order, are Jose Altuve, Charlie Blackmon, Matt Carpenter, Aroldis Chapman, Yu Darvish, Freddie Freeman, Paul Goldschmidt, Craig Kimbrel, Andrew McCutchen, Salvador Perez, Anthony Rizzo, Chris Sale, Max Scherzer, Giancarlo Stanton and Mike Trout, the 2014 All-Star MVP. In addition, two other 2014 All-Stars appeared in the big leagues earlier this year but are no longer on rosters: José Abreu and Julio Teheran.

Of those 16 All-Stars still in the majors today, six are still with their teams they played for in 2014: Altuve, Blackmon, Carpenter, McCutchen, Perez and Trout. (Although Carpenter, with St. Louis, and McCutchen, with Pittsburgh, both left and returned.) And three of those players were selected for the 2024 All-Star Game: Altuve, Perez and Sale, although Perez is the only one of the three who will play, as Altuve is injured after getting hit on the hand at Target Field earlier this month — clearing a spot for the Twins’ Willi Castro to get added to the team — while Sale pitched Sunday.