Howard hit almost two miles of home runs tonight

With a typical Chris Berman understated assessment, the home run derby ended and a new Phils player was cursed with winning the darn thing.

Berman then offered the next pat answer, that the AL has been dominant the last few years but those young, pesky NL'ers, as demonstrated by derby finalists Howard and Wright, are ready to turn the tide or some such old saw.

ESPN also has an article on how many first-time All-Stars are invited to this year's game, 23.

"That is a big number," Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez said. "I didn't realize it was that big."

"There are big names missing that are truly All-Stars, you can start with [Barry] Bonds, [Ken] Griffey and [Craig] Biggio," NL manager Phil Garner said. "But it's exciting for baseball. ... We are embarking on a new era."

Twenty-three newbies, that must be a record, right? Well, the record is 36 in 1933, the first year of the All-Star game, of course. But 23 must be near the top, right?

Actually, there hasn't been a year since 1998 in which there were not at least 22 first-time All-Stars. The high for that period was 32 in 2003. Here are the all-time highs for first-timers:

Well, maybe the players are younger than today even though the number of first-timers is not that impressive. The average 2006 All-Star is 29.2 years old. How does that rank?

It's not one of the lowest:

Then again, it's far from the oldest:

I guess it's lower than it's been the last few years, so that's an improvement, but that's far from encouraging.

We have a 41-year-old starting pitcher for the AL who was tabbed by Ozzie Guillen in typical eccentric fashion. Pudge Rodriguez makes an appearance and thereby passes Mike Piazza in third for the most appearances by a catcher.

Yes, there are some older stars who are enjoying a three-day vacay, but that's part of the game. If we need a quirky storyline for the game, how about some retrospective on how the Pirates went from a real team to a shell of a team, however, the All-Star game host, whose most distinguishing characteristicss are the yellow pj tops that they forced the NL to wear? Or how about Mark Redman's surprise at being picked for the team?