MIKE SCIOSCIA

All-Star Game festivities start in earnest with the Futures Game, where some of the best prospects in Major League Baseball will play a seven-inning matchup at Dodger Stadium on Saturday.

A Japanese team of All-Stars fulfilled a determined national mission to win the Olympic baseball gold medal for the first time, beating the United States 2-0 behind Munetaka Murakami’s third-inning home run.

Day 15 of the Tokyo Games will feature the American women going for gold in basketball, volleyball and water polo.

Yuki Yanagita tied it with an RBI grounder off Scott McGough in the ninth inning, Takuya Kai hit a winning single against Edwin Jackson in the 10th and Japan beat the United States 7-6 Monday night to reach the Olympic semifinals.

At 35 and close to the end of his baseball career, Todd Frazier is on the U.S. Olympic team for the Tokyo Games.

While most Olympic events are a competition among the best, the better you are in baseball, the less of a chance you have of playing for gold.