NL desperately seeks to end losing

Associated Press

ANAHEIM, Calif.

Ryan Howard is sick of all the talk about the American League’s dominance in the All-Star game.

The Phillies slugger knows all too well it’s been 13 years of AL bragging rights. And, no, that wacky 7-7 tie in 2002 did little to boost NL morale in baseball’s Midsummer Classic.

In this year of the pitcher, the National League is downright loaded, even for an All-Star game with the best of the best coming to Orange County tonight.

“This should be the year for us to go out there and hopefully end this drought,” Howard said. “I’m getting tired of hearing about the American League winning and how long they’ve won, every year for the last 13 years or whatnot. Basically go out there and try to change it up.”

There’s Colorado 15-game winner Ubaldo Jimenez starting at Angel Stadium. In the bullpen: Marlins ace Josh Johnson, Mr. Perfect Roy Halladay and two-time reigning NL Cy Young Award winner Tim Lincecum. And so on.

The AL run is one of the more perplexing streaks in sports. Is it simply a quirk, or evidence of true dominance? The American League has ruled interleague play for several years, and also done well in the World Series, winning four of the last six titles.

You’d think the NL might have caught a break at some point in a span of more than a decade, just getting one ball to bounce its way.

In 2008 at Yankee Stadium, the National League had 15 innings to make it happen and came up short. The previous year in San Francisco, a crazy ball off the wall gave Ichiro Suzuki the first inside-the-park home run in All-Star game history.

With a star-studded lineup of New York Yankees gathered in sunny, surf-crazed Southern California, even the Angels’ infamous rally monkey will probably be rooting for the AL if things are close late in the game.

The last time the NL won was 1996, when the Milwaukee Brewers were still in the AL. Not that many remember the 6-0 NL victory at Philly’s old Veterans Stadium.

“This will be Charlie’s second straight year to try to beat that stupid American League jinx,” Phillies chairman Bill Giles said of the Philadelphia and NL skipper, Charlie Manuel. “Charlie, your job’s on the line, man.”

It was Giles’ father, Warren, the former National League president, who used to enter the NL clubhouse and give fired-up speeches to help rally and ready his players for the All-Star game.

These days, there are graphic monkeys bouncing all over the big screen, Thunderstix and Vuvuzelas — oops, not those noisemakers, they aren’t allowed at Angel Stadium.

CC Sabathia isn’t sure any of that stuff really matters much.

“I can’t say it’s better players,” said the burly Yankees ace, who won’t pitch tonight. “It’s just one of those things. What is it, 13 years in a row? It’s pretty much luck I guess.”

A new rule keeps Sabathia and other pitchers who started on Sunday from being on the active roster. Tampa Bay lefty David Price will start for the AL.

The NL players believe it’s their turn to finally turn the page on this decade-old drought.

And why not think that way? This game is being played within miles of Disneyland — “Happiest Place on Earth” — where thousands of kids (adults, too) get to dream big every day. Six-foot-tall, baseball-themed Mickey Mouse statues, some painted in stars and wearing caps or holding baseballs, are scattered around town.

“We know everyone’s here to have a good time but at the same time our priority is to win the game,” Jimenez said.