• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, July 14, 2005

Calling Barry Bonds and Derek Jeter and Mark Burnett -- the All Star Game needs you.

Just over 12.3 million viewers watched the Major League Baseball's All-Star Game, which resulted in a Nielsen 4.3 rating/13 share -- the lowest ratings since 1970 when the game was first aired in primetime. The show dropped 14 percent from last year, or 1.5 million viewers.

Bad news? Maybe low-rate network shows are just commonplace these days -- and rarely deserve headlines. The good news is Major League Baseball's All-Star event is still the best rated of the four major sports. The NBA All-Star Game averaged 8.08 million viewers on TNT in February, and the NFL's Pro Bowl drew 6.16 million one week earlier on ESPN.

Even though baseball decided some years ago to make the game mean something -- to the victor goes home field advantage for that league's team, but it didn't draw in viewers. Last year's All Star game was also the lowest-rated All Star baseball game at that time.

Perhaps the game needs yet another twist, like a few players dancing during the seventh inning stretch with some of the fans in the stands. "Dancing With the Baseball Stars" is what people want to see. Cleats and all. (Watch your toes!)

To make matters worse, the All Star game didn't even have any competition. The best effort came from the second night of CBS' new "Rock Star: INXS," which drew in about half the All Star games's audience -- 6.1 million viewers. Its lead-in "Big Brother 6" did a little bit better at 8.3 million.

Maybe baseball needs a little more controversy, like a little more back biting in the locker room, reality TV-style. Didn't the owners of the "Miss America" pageant float the possibility of that show becoming more like reality TV?

Summer audiences are used to a healthy amount of sniping sarcasm from their friendly, neighborhood reality shows. Baseball needs its own bit of pushing and shoving -- but not exactly what Texas Rangers' pitcher Kenny Rogers did to a Dallas TV station's camera man some days ago.

The All-Star game was lacking crowd favorites Bonds and Jeter. So, the next best thing would be to add some realism to the contest, such as spitting, swearing, and live audio of managers kicking sand in front of umpires. Some sports pre-season and exhibition games have had coaches, managers, and the occasional player miked up for TV. So why not?

It's time for some players to get voted out of the batter's box -- and into the dugout -- for all to hear.