​John Smoltz will call the MLB All-Star Game alongside Joe Davis on Fox on Tuesday night.Ahead of the Midsummer Classic, the Hall of Fame pitcher spoke to Front Office Sports about the culture of baseball players who ultimately appear in the All-Star Game putting forth their full effort, what he thinks about teams positioning their aces to avoid the exhibition, and Davis’s rise. Smoltz also weighed in on looming labor issues and the question of whether MLB can sustain two expansion teams.AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementFront Office Sports: What is it about baseball, and the culture of the sport, where the players who do play in the All-Star Game really go all out physically relative to the NFL and NBA, where the Pro Bowl and All-Star Game often have so little competition they can’t even be characterized as glorified scrimmages?John Smoltz: I agree; that’s why it’s unfair how everybody keeps calling for changes to the MLB All-Star Game. It’s the best All-Star Game. It’s absolutely played like a regular-season game. Nobody’s in there throwing 85-mile-per-hour meatballs to see if guys can hit home runs. I think that part has always been an intriguing shining star on our sport.Now, can we spruce things up and do different things? Yeah, I don’t see why not. But I think that’s the sport that gets lopped in because other sports have had a hard time doing exactly what I just said.FOS: What do you think about the Brewers and Pirates slotting dynamic young pitchers Jacob Misiorowski and Paul Skenes for the Sunday before the All-Star Game, making them ineligible for the NL Tuesday? [Note: This was recorded before Miz got scrapped from Sunday’s start due to arm fatigue.] JS: A lot of this has always come down to timing, and we’re in an era where there’s been a ton of injuries. So, you can understand the mindset. We didn’t have that mindset 15 to 20 years ago. Whether you pitched on Sunday or not, you were going to pitch on Tuesday because it was an inning or two. But a lot has changed here and you can understand that, especially with the rate at which everyone’s getting hurt. It just happens to be where a club wants that pitcher to pitch, or where he falls in the lineup, so that part I completely understand.AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementFOS: When you pitched in an All-Star Game, what was your mindset in terms of wanting to compete but also not wanting to disrupt your regular-season routine?JS: It was an honor to be selected to showcase the kind of year you’re having, and you want to be at your best. You can adopt the mindset that it doesn’t matter, but any player that does that doesn’t have a heartbeat for what this game represents.Now, at the end of the day, if it doesn’t go well, it shouldn’t ruin your season, but in 1996 I got the win in Philadelphia the last time they had the All-Star Game, so that’s going to be a pretty cool moment for me just remembering how that was and the amount of fun that I ha