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Viewers stay up to watch All-Star Game
STORY TOOLS 
More from SportsTuesday night's All-Star Game on Fox was a classic, from the pregame introductions of the starting lineup intermingled with a dazzling cast of Hall of Famers, to the 15-inning thriller won 4-3 by the American League.
The game didn't end until 1:38 a.m. in New York and I'm always amused by how networks will show the scoreboard clock at it gets to be midnight and then 1 a.m. Of course, if Fox had started the game before 8:45 p.m. EDT, it wouldn't have ended quite so late.
The rating for the game was a 9.3 with a 16 percent share of the audience, the highest for an All-Star Game since 2002. Although national viewing fell as game went into extra innings, ratings on the West Coast grew stronger. The Los Angeles market, which includes Ventura County, posted an 8.5 rating for the first nine innings and a 10.3 for innings 10-15.
ESPN's 6.4 rating for Monday's Home Run Derby was the highest rating for any cable TV show this year.
Come to Papa: The NFL Network named Bob Papa as its new play-by-play man on its Thursday and Saturday night games for next season, replacing Bryant Gumbel. Papa, known more nationally for his boxing and Olympics work, is also the radio voice of the New York Giants. Cris Collinsworth will stay on as analyst.
Other notes: TNT averaged a 4.2 rating for its six NASCAR races, which, Sports Business Daily reports, is about the same as last year. Versus' Tour de France morning telecasts are averaging a 0.3 rating, also flat from last year. Trent Dilfer has joined ESPN as an NFL studio analyst. The final two episodes of "Dale Jr.: Shifting Gears," documenting Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s move to Hendrick Motorsports, will be at 4 p.m. on Tuesday and on Friday, July 25.
— Jim Carlisle
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