Fenway Park in line for All-Star Game, with one giant caveat: Report

Fenway Park hasn’t hosted an MLB All-Star Game since 1999, although not for lack of trying.

Red Sox fans clamored for the Midsummer Classic to return to Boston in 2012 for the 100th anniversary of Fenway’s opening, and again for the United States’ 250th birthday this summer. The Red Sox didn’t get to host either, but they’re back in play for an upcoming game, according to USA Today insider Bob Nightengale.

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred told reporters Fenway Park was sizing up to host the 2032 All-Star game, Nightengale wrote Sunday, but that came with an enormous asterisk.

That 2032 projection is “barring the 2027 game getting canceled due to a work stoppage,” per Nightengale. The more we learn about the labor negotiations, the more a work stoppage feels like an inevitability.

It therefore feels unlikely that Ceddanne Rafaela, who is scheduled to enter free agency at the end of the 2032 season, will be welcoming out-of-towners to his digs that year. Perhaps there is an outside chance Roman Anthony, who is signed through 2034 including an club option, could be Boston’s gray-haired representative.

Boston has waited 27 years to host All-Star festivities. What’s another year — or nine?

More MLB: One of MLB’s Best Shortstops ‘Not a Fit’ for Yankees at Trade Deadline