Category: Sports News

Editor's note: Follow along for live updates and highlights from the 2026 MLB All-Star Game.

Philadelphia fans embraced Mike Trout like one of their own at the 2026 MLB All-Star Game.

The event serves as a homecoming of sorts for the Los Angeles Angels star. The three-time MVP is a New Jersey native but has deep ties to Philadelphia, which is located 45 miles south of his hometown.

Trout received a loud ovation from the crowd as he was introduced before the Midsummer Classic.

A nice cheer for Mike Trout as he makes his return to the All-Star Game!

📺: FOX pic.twitter.com/1jixyUfXM0

— FOX Sports (@FOXSports) July 15, 2026

"It's been everything," Trout said about this All-Star experience during a pregame interview on the broadcast. "… Philly is a special place, it's where I grew up and it's awesome."

Trout served as the American League's leadoff hitter but struck out in his first at-bat against Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Cristopher Sanchez.

Among those in the crowd cheering for Trout were his friends and family.

It was Trout's first All-Star Game appearance since 2019, allowing his two sons, Beckham Aaron and Jordy Michael, to watch him play in the event.

Trout was named as an All-Star for the 12th time in his career. He was selected eight consecutive times from 2012 through 2019.

Paul Skenes might not be pitching in the All-Star Game, but that didn’t stop him from getting dressed up – with his girlfriend, Olivia “Livvy” Dunne. 

Skenes, who was selected to be an All-Star but won’t pitch due to his schedule, posed in an Instagram selfie with Dunne — and on the red carpet — wearing a blue suit, blue pants, a white shirt and a dark blue tie. 

He was pictured next to Dunne, who donned a black and blue dress. 

Dunne held a blue bag in her selfie, which was captioned: “throwing a fit.” 

While being interviewed by reporters on Tuesday, Skenes talked more about his outfit, talking about his alligator boots and an American flag on his tie. 

Dunne, who said she’s wearing Miss Rosier, added she hoped to match Skenes and that he always wears red, white or blue and is a “Patriot.” 

Skenes and Dunne have been together since 2023, when they met while attending LSU.

Skenes’ baseball career has forced their relationship to be long-distance at times, but Dunne said they’ve remained close. 

“I mean, he makes time to come to my events,” Dunne told People in March. “I make time to go watch him pitch. I try to make every start I can.” 

After being selected first overall in the 2023 MLB Draft, Skenes has blossomed into one of the league’s top pitchers.

He followed his Rookie of the Year win and 1.96 ERA in 2024 by striking out 216 hitters in a Cy Young-winning 2025 campaign. 

Skenes has taken a slight step back in 2026 with a 3.57 ERA but remains one of baseball’s premier young players on an ascending Pirates team. 

While Dunne is no longer a gymnast, she’s now coming to the small screen in the fall and will be part of Fox’s “Baywatch” reboot in her first true foray into acting.

The MLB All-Star Game brings the best players in the game together for a friendly exhibition. But if the game is close as the end draws near, the pressure and the intensity rise to another level.

And if it goes down to the wire, there won't be any extra innings. Instead, if the game is tied after the bottom of the ninth, MLB has created a fun way to settle the score that borrows from the Home Run Derby the previous night.

And last season, a home-run tiebreaker was used for the first time since the new rule was implemented.

Roch Cholowsky is having the time of his life — and his bank account isn’t doing badly either.

Just days after being selected No. 1 overall by the White Sox in the 2026 MLB Draft, Cholowsky signed his rookie contract that includes a record-breaking $10.35 million signing bonus, sources told ESPN.

Cholowsky’s bonus tops the previous mark of $9.25 million for Chase Burns and Charlie Condon in 2024 draft. The slot value for the first pick this year was $11.3 million, so even with the record, the bonus came in slightly under value.

While Chicago hasn’t confirmed the deal, Cholowsky threw out the first pitch at Sunday’s White Sox win and sat in a luxury suite with friends and family. 

“I did see the video [of the first pitch], and I saw the crowd. So it was very exciting,” Cholowsky’s father, Dan, told reporters.

“He flew out 2 or 3 weeks ago and fell in love with the city [Chicago]. I want what’s best for him.” 

“Since he’s been young, I’ve always treated him like a man and I respect his decisions. He said everyone was great to him and he loves it,” Dan added. 

Cholowsky, a 6-foot-2 shortstop, hit .320 with 21 home runs, 60 RBIs and a 1.088 OPS in 60 games for UCLA in 2026. 

Despite falling short of a College World Series title, the Bruins went 51-6 in Cholowsky’s final season. 

Cholowsky hit .329 with 52 homers, 167 RBIs and a 1.072 OPS in 178 games across three seasons with the Bruins. 

He also became the first UCLA player selected first overall since Gerrit Cole went to the Pirates in 2011. 

“You look at what he has done throughout his baseball career, both at UCLA, but prior to that,” White Sox general manager Chris Getz told reporters Saturday. “We had interest in him in high school and then to be able to watch his college career unfold and see what he accomplished and the impact that he had on his teammates and that program and now to envision that type of influence within this organization is something that attracted us to select him at No. 1.”

Cease, bullpen combine on 3-hitter in AL's 4-0 win, first All-Star shutout since 2013 originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

Dylan Cease struck out the side in the first inning, combining with 10 relievers on a three-hitter in a show of pitching dominance that led the American League to a 4-0 win over the National League in Tuesday night’s All-Star Game.

All-Star MVP Cody Bellinger hit a two-run single and Ben Rice followed with an RBI single in the first against Cristopher Sánchez of the host Philadelphia Phillies.

Miguel Vargas of the Chicago White Sox added an eighth-inning home run off the Los Angeles Dodgers‘ Justin Wrobleski, who was pitching on his 26th birthday, for the game’s only extra-base hit. The AL won for the 18th time in 23 games and holds a 49-45-2 advantage overall.

Singles by Juan Soto in the fourth, Pete Crow-Armstrong in the eighth and Otto Lopez in the ninth were the only hits by the NL, which failed to advance a runner past first.

Pitchers combined for 27 strikeouts, 15 by AL hurlers.

Cease struck out Kyle Schwarber, Soto and CJ Abrams around a walk in the first inning. He became just the seventh pitcher to strike out three in an All-Star opening inning after Carl Hubbell (1934), Warren Spahn (1949), Jim Palmer (1977), Dave Stieb (1983), Pedro Martinez (1999) and Brad Penny (2006) — four of them Hall of Famers.

Parker Messick, Michael Wacha, Joe Ryan, Nick Martinez, Cade Smith, Drew Rasmussen, Jacob Latz, Louis Varland, Aroldis Chapman and Bryan Baker finished the first All-Star shutout since the AL’s 2-0 win in 2013 at New York’s Citi Field.

Some starting star power was missing, with Jacob Misoriowski, Paul Skenes and Shohei Ohtani all unavailable. Just six pitches reached 100 mph, the fewest in an All-Star Game since 2021.

Bellinger and Rice both singled on up sinkers from Sánchez, who struggled through a 34-pitch inning that included three hits and two walks.

“It just took me a little time to soak it all in and enjoy it,” Sánchez said through a translator.

Mike Trout, a 12-time All-Star who hadn’t played in the game since 2019 because of injuries, went 0 for 3 with a strikeout.

Documenting the day

Managers and starters entered through replica Liberty Bells in front of each dugout, walked to home plate and used a feathered quill to sign an oversized lineup card, as if they were Founding Fathers affixing names to the Declaration of Independence. The dirt was surrounded by 13 stars, one for each of the Colonies.

Fireworks were set off after the fourth inning to a video of Ray Charles singing “America the Beautiful” at Game 2 of the 2001 World Series.

Philadelphia was awarded this year’s All-Star Game in 2019 an unusually long lead time to coincide with the U.S. 250th semiquincentennial. The Phillies hosted the 1976 and ’96 games at Veterans Stadium and the Athletics in 1943 and ’52 at Shibe Park.

At the 1996 game, there was a hard hit even before the first pitch. Cal Ripken Jr.’s nose was broken when struck by a forearm of Chicago White Sox reliever Roberto Hernandez when he lost his balance on a platform during the AL team picture.

Next year’s game is scheduled for the Chicago Cubs’ Wrigley Field for the first time since 1990 but is threatened by possible labor strife.

Philadelphia's All-Star Game gave Brandon Marsh “that October feeling” originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia

Brandon Marsh didn’t sound like a guy who had just struck out twice in his first All-Star Game.

No. He sounded like a guy who’d just had the time of his life.

The All-Star Game is an exhibition. A respite from the intensity of the regular season. A chance to get to know some rivals as teammates for a couple of days. It’s supposed to be entertaining for the fans and fun for the players.

Marsh, who started for the National League in right field, had a blast.

“That was some of the most fun I’ve had in a long time on a baseball field,” he said after leaving the game. “Seeing all the guys out there, dudes that I’ve looked up to for a long time. Being able to learn and pick their brains for a couple of days. And tonight – just the game – I got that October feeling. A little shakiness in the legs in that first at-bat.

“It was everything I could have asked for.”

The NL lost the game, 4-0, to the American League squad in the electric environment of Citizens Bank Park.

It wasn’t the best of nights for the members of the Phillies. NL starter Cristopher Sanchez gave up three runs in the first inning and took the loss. Two of the runs came on a base hit by Cody Bellinger, the game’s MVP. The NL had just three hits. Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper went hitless with a pair of strikeouts in three total at-bats. Pitching ruled. There were 27 strikeouts in the game.

Thank goodness for Jesus Luzardo and Jhoan Duran. They gave Phillies fans something to pump their fists about. Both pitched scoreless ball. Luzardo got through the fourth inning on just six pitches. Duran covered two outs in the ninth in just four.

Despite the struggles of some Phillies, it was a win of a night for the organization. The Phillies and MLB put on a heck of a show, one the late David Montgomery would have been proud of. He’s the guy who held off pushing for an All-Star Game in the years following the opening of Citizens Bank Park. He always wanted the game in 2026 as part of the nation’s 250^th birthday celebration.

“Philly made these last couple of days really special,” Marsh said. “It’s been nothing short of amazing. And it’s been everything I ever dreamed of. I’m blessed to be here. I made a bunch of memories that I know I’m going to keep forever.”

One of Marsh’s memories came in the fifth inning when the movie Sandlot came to life on the field. Kids with baseball gloves dangling from their handlebars pedaled bikes onto the field as a video of Ray Charles singing America the Beautiful at the 2001 World Series played on the scoreboard. The kids interacted with players on the field as fireworks filled the sky. For a moment, everyone in the ballpark was a kid again on the Fourth of July.

“Honestly, that was one of my favorite parts of the game because that was my favorite baseball movie growing up,” Marsh said. “When I hear that song, it almost brings tears to my eyes because it takes me back to being five years old watching that movie. It was special.”

Marsh was able to chat with one of the kids who rode his bike onto the field.

“We were talking,” Marsh said. “He told me his grandma was a huge fan of the Phillies and of me personally. We took a video and sent it to her.”

Wow!

An in-game video with the NL’s starting right fielder. What a memory for that kid.

“He was ready,” Marsh said of the iPhone-carrying kid. “Locked and loaded.”

Marsh’s improvement this season has been a huge factor in the Phillies’ cutting their deficit in the NL East from 10.5 games on May 22 to two games at the All-Star break. Since the start of May 2025, he’s hitting .302, fourth-best in the majors.

Marsh, 28, believes his All-Star experience will only make him a better player.

“Just watching the best pros in the game, how they do it, learning to be more of a professional, little insights in the game,” he said. “Putting some stuff in the routine and just learning.

“I could go on and on with all the intel I got the last couple of days. To keep it short and sweet, just how to be a better pro.”

Good stuff.

Marsh, Sanchez, Schwarber, Harper, Luzardo and Duran will all get a day off Wednesday. On Thursday night, it’s back to the grind – a series against the New York Mets.

Philadelphia’s All-Star Game is over.

Before you know it, October will be here. Marsh wants that feeling again.

“More than anything,” he said. “I’ll do just about anything to get there. And I know the guys in our clubhouse would say the same thing. We put ourselves in a better position right before the break. We started slow but we’re back in the fight. We’re within striking distance. We just have to keep it day to day and enjoy it.”

Disagreements between MLB, the MLB Players Association and officials with the 2028 Olympics has slowed momentum from the game’s biggest stars participating in the Summer Games, according to a new report. 

The three sides have been in ongoing conflict over the specifics of baseball at the Olympics for months per ESPN. 

Particular sticking points revolve around hotel rooms, tickets and a mandatory-participation agreement.

LA28 and MLB are seeking a quick solution as the two plan to shut down the league for 11 days to accommodate an All-Star Game and a six-team Olympic tournament. 

The MLBPA has been reluctant to sign an agreement, seeking a deal similar to what the International Olympic Committee, National Hockey League and NHLPA signed to bring NHL players back to the Olympics in 2026 after 12 years away. 

“We made a proposal to the union which included a schedule and a mandatory participation agreement,” MLB spokesman Glen Caplin said, according to ESPN. “The union then pursued a negotiation with LA28 over largely economic issues, including housing and tickets, and told us they would not respond until they finished with LA28.”

Sources told ESPN that MLB is seeking mandated participation that would place players who avoid participation in the Games on the restricted list — without pay — from July 12 to Aug. 3. 

The MLBPA strongly opposed the idea, specifically the punishment, and commissioner Rob Manfred’s ability “to discipline for just cause” with “a fine and/or unpaid suspension” under the clause. 

The players union also pursued negotiations over housing and tickets, seemingly asking for hotel rooms for players and tickets available for their friends and family.

Despite four All-Stars telling ESPN on Monday they would be willing to stay in the Olympic Village on UCLA’s campus, LA28 offered 435 hotel rooms on top of the 100 reserved by MLB and another 100 for the Japanese national team.

The desire to allow MLB players to participate in the Olympics has risen drastically amongst players and fans after the success of the 2026 World Baseball Classic. 

The United States, Dominican Republic and WBC champion Venezuela have already qualified, with others coming from the Premier12 tournament set to take place in November 2027. 

“I hope LA ’28 happens,” Harper told USA Today in March. “I’m hoping the next CBA agreement can happen where teams and players can come to an agreement on taking that two-week break, especially it being in our home country.

“It would be great for baseball. You talk about growing the game and being able to grow it at that, at the highest level would help out tremendously.”

Baseball became an official Olympic sport in 1992 and ran through 2008. It returned for the 2020 Summer Games in Tokyo, with Japan winning gold and the United States taking silver. The U.S. roster included the likes of Joe Ryan, Triston Casas, Shane Baz and Nick Martinez.

The players union added that the league’s stars would like to play in the Olympics under the right conditions.

“In general, our players want to play in the Olympics,” Bruce Meyer, head of the MLBPA, said Tuesday, according to The Athletic. “They’re patriotic, and for them it’s a special opportunity, and we want them to have that opportunity.

“Having said that, we want to make sure that they have things like travel and accommodations and things that they deserve based on who they are.”

Dylan Cease faces Cristopher Sánchez to begin the 2026 All-Star game at Citizens Bank Park on Tuesday.

ALL-STAR GAME INFO

• Teams: American League vs. National League
• Stadium: Citizens Bank Park, Philadelphia, PA
• Time: 5:00 p.m. PT
• TV: FOX
• Radio: ESPN Radio

PHILADELPHIA — The bosses of Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association spoke Tuesday and expressed belief the game is doing well — which is about where their agreement ended.

A chief disagreement: Both suggest fans are on their side, and MLB’s effort to ensure support has not been appreciated by the union.

To win fan support, MLB launched a “Level the Playing Field” advertising campaign that has become inescapable, particularly on its TV network. The league says it is responding to fan concerns about competitive balance by attempting to overhaul the economic system and install a salary cap and floor — which players are fighting — in the next collective bargaining agreement.

“I have watched over the last few years the owners, the commissioner’s office, try to convince fans — the consumers of their product — that the product is broken,” Bruce Meyer, the interim executive director of the MLBPA, said at a gathering with reporters before the All-Star Game. “Trying to convince fans and the world that, you know what, you are going to these games in record numbers, including small-market teams that have actually been at the forefront of increases in attendance — and instead, the league, the supposed stewards of the game, has spent an inordinate amount of time trying to convince those same fans that they don’t have hope, or they shouldn’t have hope.

“… I think it’s perverse.”

The league argues it is reflecting a view heard overwhelmingly from fans.

“We’re listening to our fans,” commissioner Rob Manfred said in a separate Q&A with reporters. “What our fans in a number of our markets are telling us — better than half of them — is there’s a lack of competitive balance in the game and everything we propose is directed at addressing that fan concern.”

At the heart of the labor fight is ownership’s assertion that small-market teams lack a fair chance to succeed, and the players’ arguments that payroll does not guarantee victories, and if small-market owners want to spend more, they can.

“In order for this game to reach its full potential … we need to make sure that fans in markets, at the beginning of the season, have a realistic belief that their team has a chance to win,” Manfred said. “I think that we need a system where fans, particularly in smaller markets, can have some hope that the players that are signed and developed by their organizations can actually stay there through free agency.”

Meyer’s response: Look at the records of the Brewers, Guardians, Rays and Cardinals over the past decade, and look at the young stars many small-market clubs have locked up long before free agency. Additionally, the owners of those clubs can simply spend more money on major league salary.

“The fans in those markets deserve to have them compete,” said Meyer, who took over after Tony Clark was forced out in February, “and the fact that [those owners] want this all-purpose excuse to not have to compete doesn’t change the fact that competitive balance in baseball is healthy.”

Do fans agree? Yes, Manfred said, citing a “sophisticated” process in which the league uses professional pollsters and focus groups, among other sources.

No, said Meyer, who pointed to a poll in The Athletic in which just 34 percent of respondents said their favorite team would have “a significantly better chance at making the postseason in a cap system.”

“If they were so concerned about fans,” Meyer said of the league’s owners, “they would be listening to the fans all across baseball who are literally chanting, ‘Sell the team.’ ”

No small-market team since the Royals in 2015 has won the World Series. On the other hand, Meyer pointed at the struggles of the Mets, who have “the richest owner,” and the Yankees, who “have won one World Series in the last 25 years.”

“That doesn’t sound like an existential crisis,” Meyer said.

Manfred countered that there are always exceptions, but that “over a very long period of time, there’s a very strong relationship between who gets into the playoffs and who proceeds, notwithstanding the exceptions.”

Both sides have exchanged initial proposals for a new CBA ahead of the current agreement expiring Dec. 1. The expectation is the league will lock out the players as negotiations then pick up.

Last month, President Donald Trump said MLB should have a salary cap. A sports fan known to interject himself into issues past presidents avoided, Trump could intervene if a lockout drags on.

Asked if he would welcome intervention, Manfred declined to speculate.

“He is a great sports fan, and he is really knowledgeable about the business of sports, so it doesn’t surprise me he’s interested,” Manfred said. “But beyond that, I’m going to pass [on the question].”

Both the league and union want players to participate in the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, but hang-ups include the league wanting mandatory participation, according to ESPN.

Unlike the World Baseball Classic, which occurs in spring as players are ramping up, the Olympics will be midseason, when pitchers will be stretched out and hitters in rhythm.

“We went down the road on LA 2028 because we saw it as a unique opportunity to market the sport with our very, very best players,” Manfred said. “It is a disruptive undertaking for us. Put money to one side — you’re disrupting the entire season. And if we’re going to undertake that effort, we want our very best out there so that people see how great our game really is.”

Meyer said the two sides are in a “very early stage” of discussion.

“In general, our players want to play in the Olympics,” Meyer said. “… We want to make sure that [players] have things like travel and accommodations and things that they deserve based on who they are.”

Meyer said the union has cooperated with a federal investigation into a youth baseball company owned and created by the MLBPA.

Reading from a statement, Meyer said, “It’s our understanding the MLBPA and its current staff are not and have never been targets of this ongoing investigation.”