The official announcement of Wrigley’s next Midsummer Classic will come later this month. In the meantime, here’s the story of possibly the worst Home Run Derby ever.
After a 37-year absence, the Cubs and Wrigley Field will once again host MLB’s All-Star Game two summers from now in 2027. According to Bob Nightengale in USA Today, the official announcement will come later this month:
The Chicago Cubs have been approved by Major League Baseball to host the 2027 All-Star Game – and will make the announcement July 30 in Chicago. It will be the Cubs’ first All-Star Game since 1990. The Philadelphia Phillies will host the 2026 All-Star Game, while the Toronto Blue Jays and Baltimore Orioles are the front-runners to host in 2028.
That 1990 All-Star Game was the first in the Friendly Confines under the lights and first on the North Side since 1962. As part of the festivities, Wrigley was also scheduled to host a Home Run Derby the day before the game.
The Home Run Derby was something fairly new at the ASG. In 1990 it was in just its sixth year, and back then it was a shorter event held in conjunction with All-Star Workout Day held the day before the ASG. It wasn’t televised and took place in the afternoon. Before 1991, the Derby was structured as a two-inning event with each player allowed five outs per “inning,” without tiebreakers. This wound up resulting in co-winners in 1986 (Wally Joyner and Darryl Strawberry) and 1989 (Eric Davis and Ruben Sierra).
What this format had accomplished was having winners with only a handful of home runs. Davis and Sierra had won the previous year’s Derby in Anaheim with only three homers and the eight players in that year’s contest had combined for 14 long balls.
Fourteen doesn’t seem like a lot of homers for a modern Home Run Derby, and it’s not. But the eight participants wouldn’t get close to that at Wrigley Field on July 9, 1990.
Those eight hitters were Ryne Sandberg, Matt Williams, Bobby Bonilla and Strawberry for the National League and Jose Canseco, Mark McGwire, Cecil Fielder and Ken Griffey Jr. for the American League. Those eight combined to hit 291 home runs during the 1990 regular season. Fielder hit 51, becoming the first player to hit 50 or more since George Foster in 1977.
In the 1990 Home Run Derby, these eight players combined for just five home runs, three of them by Sandberg. Ryno became the Derby champion, fun for the hometown crowd. The only other dingers were hit by Williams and McGwire, one each.
Why did this happen? Chicago’s notoriously fickle weather. The day before the Derby, Sunday, July 8, had been hot and humid, with temperatures in the 90s and strong southwest winds. Too bad the Derby couldn’t have been held that day, Waveland and Sheffield would have been annihilated by baseballs. But overnight Sunday into Monday, a cold front came crashing through the Chicago area. Temperatures dropped into the low 70s, well below average for that time of year, with strong winds blowing from the north.
I was there that afternoon. It felt more like September than July. And the howling winds kept blowing baseballs back into the yard. Sandberg, who was quite familiar with Wrigley’s winds, knew how to slash line drives into the bleachers. Here is the only video I could find of Ryno’s “heroics” that afternoon:
The results of that Home Run Derby were so bad that the format was changed the following year, expanding to three rounds. From 1991–2006, eight to 10 players were selected and instead of five outs, 10 were allowed for each round, after which the count was re-et, with the top four advancing to the second round, and the top two advancing to the final.
The difference was immediate — 27 home runs were hit in the 1991 Derby in Toronto, with Cal Ripken Jr. the winner with 12, and 40 were hit in 1992 in San Diego. Now, of course, players routinely hit a couple dozen per round, and that provides a much better show, especially for ESPN in prime time.
But I will never forget the 1990 Home Run Derby, when the Wrigley Field wind defeated almost all of the game’s best home run hitters. You will almost certainly get a better show tonight.