Shohei Ohtani’s Team Up With Livvy Dunne & Paul Skenes Dominates All-Star Buzz, But the Stealth Astros and the AL Figure to Have the Last Laugh

ARLINGTON — Livvy Dunne and Paul Skenes turned MLB’s All-Star Game red carpet into a real anticipated event. Shohei Ohtani, almost pushed to the side by baseball’s young It Couple, reminded everyone why he’s the closest thing we’ve seen to Tiger Woods in his prime (pure appointment TV) since. And somehow they were all on the same team. Skenes, Ohtani, Livvy, all rooting for the National League.

This is what North Texas’ MLB All-Star Game will be remembered for, what will stick with those who crammed into baseball’s hulking spaceship stadium to watch. The rookie flamethrower who started. The celebrity gymnast girlfriend who charmed everyone and seemed genuinely happy to be there. And Ohtani sending a ball soaring into the stands for his first All-Star Game home run.

Red Sox outfielder Jarren Duran is the one who actually walks away with the All-Star Game MVP Award. Duran seems like an earnest guy and he’s great story of finding a way to believe in yourself. But he’s no crossover star. Even in victory, he’s a second thought to Ohtani.

Shohei tries to share the love with his veteran National League teammate Bryce Harper, the perpetually scraggily bearded Philadelphia Phillies star who looks like he’d be at home on an oil rig.

“I had an opportunity to get a pretty close look at Bryce Harper,” Ohtani says in Japanese, with his words relayed by an interpreter. “The kind of preparation that he does before the game. So really Bryce Harper stood out to me.”

Even Skenes, Harper, Skenes and super Paul fan Dunne teaming up for the National League cannot prevent the American League from winning the actual All-Star Game 5-3. It is the American League’s 10th win in the last 11 Midsummer Classics. This isn’t a statistical anomaly. It’s further confirmation of a truth that quietly looms over the second half of the baseball season.

The American League is just better. Much more power packed. Poised to win its third straight World Series. Even with Ohtani, Skenes and Harper on the NL side.

The AL is stacked this season. The last two World Series winners — the Rangers and Astros — are proof of that. If either Houston or Texas was in the National League, they’d be right there with the Phillies and Dodgers as potential World Series favorites. But in an American League with eight teams with more than 50 wins at the break, only one of the Astros and Rangers figure to make the playoffs. And if the season ended today, they’d actually both miss it.

But the season does not end at the All-Star pause (even if more baseball has been played before this particular All-State break than ever before) and the Astros are charging. Joe Espada’s once assumed dead team is 17-6 in its last 23 games, now just one game back of the division lead. Close enough for Julio Rodriguez to see Yordan Alvarez’s shadow. Yes, this American League West race could be a winner-take-all situation with only the eventual division winner making the playoffs. One or two of these teams (Houston, Seattle, Texas) will be watching the postseason on a beach somewhere.

If you think the Astros are going to be the one left out, Doris Keans Goodwin would be appalled. You need to learn your recent history.

“Super happy,” Alvarez says on the Astros’ situation. “I think the team ended pretty strong in the first half and I’m just pretty kind of happy to see what it’s going to bring out in the second half.”

Few teams in baseball had a quieter presence than the Astros at this All-Star Game in Arlington. They went near Miami Marlins dark. The incomparable Jose Altuve elected not to come despite being voted in as a starter, taking away the chance for Rangers fans to hound him with boos. Yordan Alvarez started, but he only spent a day here, not taking part in the Monday Media Day festivities and only took one at-bat (earning a walk).

During my own multiple day run in Arlington, I only came across one piece of Yordan or Astros related promotion — a near life-sized poster of Alvarez in the All-Star Village located in the Rangers’ old ballpark across the street from Globe Life Field. Yordan’s image could be found there in a line of player posters.

And you can bet the Astros are fine with that. They want to make their noise in October. As usual.

“Super happy. I think the team ended pretty strong in the first half and I’m just pretty kind of happy to see what it’s going to bring out in the second half.” — Yordan Alvarez on the Astros

The Other Texas Team

The Rangers find themselves in a more tenuous situation than their in-state rivals. Beating the Astros in another Minute Maid Park series gives Bruce Bochy’s team a jolt of life at the All-Star break. But Texas is still four games under .500, five games behind Seattle, four games behind Houston. Rangers general manager Chris Young found himself a popular figure at these All-Star festivities.

With his 6-foot-10 height, the former MLB ace is hard to miss. Even in a crowd of younger super athletes. And with his relaxed demeanor and manner (Young usually wore jeans and a colorful pair of Nike sneakers), he is easy to approach. So the Rangers GM found himself answering reporter question after reporter question on whether the defending champs are going to be buyers or sellers at the trade deadline.

Young clearly hopes the Wyatt Langford good-time run continues and it is buyers. Especially with super ace Jacob deGrom looming as a potential September difference maker.

“It was really cool to watch him do that. Really cool to watch him go about his business, and get to meet him and all that.” — Paul Skenes on Shohei Ohtani

This American League West battle figures to be one of the rare significant division races with serious consequences in the WildCard era. The American League is where the real power is — something driven home during this All-Star run in North Texas. Even with Ohtani and Skenes in the other league. Two superstars cannot hide this overriding truth.

Yordan knows this. Everyone in the heat of this American League battle for the survival of the fittest understands this.

“Just try to stay healthy, do as much as I can and hopefully go to the playoffs,” Alvarez says about his approach to the second half of the season.

Yordan Alvarez does not know what it’s like to play a season and not make the playoffs. The Astros have made it to the postseason in all six of his seasons.

Paul Skenes, as brilliant as he is, will likely find out what it’s like to miss it in his very first season. Even Skenes, who carried all the hype into this All-Star Game, left it buzzing over Ohtani. And that home run.

“It was really cool to watch him do that,” Skenes says. “Really cool to watch him go about his business, and get to meet him and all that.”

Shohei Ohtani will be in the playoffs. His joining the Dodgers’ money-manufacturing team assured that. But if you think he and these very flawed Dodgers are going to win it all, you need to look again. To the other league. And maybe those quietly rolling Astros.