{"id":252998,"date":"2026-07-15T04:23:41","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T04:23:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/15\/nls-pitching-flop-without-phillies-zack-wheeler-again-highlights-why-mlb-must-consider-revising-all-star-game-policies\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T04:23:41","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T04:23:41","slug":"nls-pitching-flop-without-phillies-zack-wheeler-again-highlights-why-mlb-must-consider-revising-all-star-game-policies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/15\/nls-pitching-flop-without-phillies-zack-wheeler-again-highlights-why-mlb-must-consider-revising-all-star-game-policies\/","title":{"rendered":"NL&#8217;s pitching flop without Phillies&#8217; Zack Wheeler again highlights why MLB must consider revising All-Star Game policies"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Boy, the National League could&#8217;ve used <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yardbarker.com\/mlb\/teams\/philadelphia_phillies\/21\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Philadelphia Phillies<\/a> starting pitcher <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yardbarker.com\/mlb\/players\/zack_wheeler\/142988\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Zack Wheeler<\/a> at the 2026 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yardbarker.com\/mlb\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">MLB\u00a0<\/a>All-Star Game on Tuesday night.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Wheeler \u2014 who&#8217;s 10-1 entering the All-Star Game, tied for the fifth-best starting record in baseball \u2014 was initially snubbed from the All-Star Game against the American League for a bogus reason. He started in a 5-0 win over the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yardbarker.com\/mlb\/teams\/detroit_tigers\/10\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Detroit Tigers\u00a0<\/a>on Sunday. Pitchers who start the Sunday before the All-Star Game are prohibited from playing. He later received an invitation but rejected it. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They disrespected me, so I&#8217;m just not going to participate in that thing,&#8221; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.yardbarker.com\/mlb\/articles\/phillies_zack_wheeler_turns_down_all_star_invite_after_initial_snub\/s1_17044_44055952\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Wheeler told<\/a> NBC Sports Philadelphia on Saturday (h\/t Field Level Media).\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The NL wishes he did. Its pitching flopped without the Cy Young candidate.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2>NL struggles without Zack Wheeler<\/h2>\n<p>Wheeler&#8217;s teammate, Cristopher Sanchez, started the All-Star Game at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia. He was deserving of that nod. Entering the All-Star Game, he&#8217;s tied for the second-best starting record (11-4) in baseball and ranks ninth in ERA (2.62). However, he didn&#8217;t look like himself in the contest.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He allowed three runs in the top of the first inning. According to The Athletic&#8217;s Matt Gelb, he has only allowed that many runs just six times in 43 starts at Citizens Bank Park since 2024.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/plain\" class=\"optanon-category-C0004\">\n    !function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)\n    {if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\n    n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};\n    if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';\n    n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\n    t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\n    s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window, document,'script',\n    'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n    fbq('init', '1324276914788316');\n    fbq('track', 'PageView');\n  <\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.yardbarker.com\/mlb\/articles\/nls_pitching_flop_without_phillies_zack_wheeler_again_highlights_why_mlb_must_consider_revising_all_star_game_policies\/s1_13132_44063017\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Boy, the National League could&#8217;ve used Philadelphia Phillies starting pitcher Zack Wheeler at the 2026 MLB\u00a0All-Star Game on Tuesday night.\u00a0 Wheeler \u2014 who&#8217;s 10-1 entering the All-Star Game, tied for the fifth-best starting record in baseball \u2014 was initially snubbed from the All-Star Game against the American League for a bogus reason. He started in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":252999,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6806],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-252998","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-gossip"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}