Home Run Derby: Start time, participants, bracket, how to watch and stream

Phillies fans won’t have a slugger to root for in Monday’s Home Run Derby, which is being held at T-Mobile Park in Seattle and begins at 8 p.m. on ESPN.

Last year, Kyle Schwarber was the top-seeded slugger entering the Derby, but was eliminated by Albert Pujols in a swing-off after each knocked out 13 home runs. Schwarber was the first Phillies player to compete in the Home Run Derby since Rhys Hoskins in 2018.

Two Phillies players will take the field Tuesday for the All-Star Game — rightfielder Nick Castellanos and closer Craig Kimbrel, who was added to the National League roster last week as a replacement for Milwaukee Brewers reliever Devin Williams. Phillies manager Rob Thompson is managing the National League’s team.

Monday’s event is the first Derby to be held in Seattle since 2001. That year, Luis Gonzalez took home the title, topping sluggers Sammy Sosa, Mark McGuire, and Alex Rodriguez.

Chicago White Sox slugger Luis Robert Jr. is the No. 1 seed entering the Derby, after having knocked out 25 homers during the first half of the season. Seeding is determined by the number of home runs hit through July 4 (tiebreakers were determined by most homers from June 15 to July 4), and just two players who were asked declined to participate: Braves first baseman Matt Olson and outfielder Ronald Acuña Jr.

Here’s everything you need to know to watch or stream the Home Run Derby:

The 2023 MLB Home Run Derby is scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. Eastern and will air live on ESPN.

The Derby will stream live for the first time on ESPN+. It will also stream on the ESPN app, though only for cable subscribers. MLB.TV will also stream the Derby, though the subscription service is hardly worth it for Phillies fans in the Philadelphia market due to its blackout rules.

The Derby can also be streamed on a host of services that have ESPN, including FuboTV, Hulu with Live TV, DirecTV Stream, Sling TV, and YouTube TV.

Calling his seventh Home Run Derby for ESPN is Karl Ravech, who will broadcast the competition alongside Eduardo Perez. Buster Olney and Alden Goncalez will report from the field. The network will also offer a Statcast telecast on ESPN2 with Kevin Brown, Jessica Mendoza, and MLB Statcast analyst Mike Petriello.

» READ MORE: Five Phillies questions and answers at the All-Star break: Trea Turner, Bryce Harper, and the starters

The seeding of the players was determined by their 2023 home run totals through Tuesday.

Then-Washington Nationals slugger Juan Soto won last year’s Derby, defeating Julio Rodríguez by just one home run in front of a record 50,999 fans at Dodger Stadium.

Soto was traded to the San Diego Padres just a month after last year’s All-Star Game. He’s hit 15 home runs and driven in 47 runs this season. Though he’s not participating in Monday’s Derby, he and teammate Josh Hader will represent the Padres in Tuesday’s All-Star Game.

The Home Run Derby dates back to 1985, and just one player has managed to win the competition three times — Hall of Famer Ken Griffey Jr.

For the second-straight season, New York Mets first baseman Pete Alonso is looking to match Griffey’s record. Alonso won the Derby in 2019 and 2021, but fell to Julio Rodríguez in the second round of last year’s competition.

Only two other players have won two Derbys — Prince Fielder (2009 and 2012) and Yoenis Céspedes (2013 and 2014).

The Derby is a single-elimination bracket event with three rounds. During the first two rounds, each batter has three minutes to belt out as many home runs as they can. During the final round, the time is reduced to two minutes per batter.

Batters are awarded 30 seconds of bonus time at the conclusion of each regulation period. A batter can earn an additional 30 seconds by belting out a home run over 440 feet during the regulation period.

Hitters are entitled to one 45-second timeout in each round, though that doesn’t extend into a batter’s bonus time.

In the event of a tie, the top two batters will face off in a 60-second swing-off. If a tie remains after that, hitters battle in successive three-swing swing-offs until there is a winner.

There have been just two ties in Derby history — Vladimir Guerrero Jr. edged out Joc Pederson in the third tiebreaker in 2019, while Juan Soto topped Shohei Ohtani in the first round of the swing-off in 2021.

The winner of the Derby takes home $1 million.