Respect your senior circuit.

Tuesday's All-Star game marks the fifth contest since baseball began assigning home-field advantage to the league that wins what used to be an exhibition.

The change was meant to make the match at midseason matter. So has it? While it's probably not fair to judge the new format on a mere four seasons, there's certainly what looks to be a pattern forming here: the AL has won all four. What's more, the AL has dominated interleague play of late.

But in the ultimate showdown of National vs. American -- the World Series -- the results are more even.

AP baseball writer Ben Walker says the AL has more large-market teams willing to spend top dollar for talent, helping give them an edge over the last decade of All-Star games. Further, since the league requires an All-Star from each team, the 14-team AL has more flexibility in designing its roster than does the 16-team NL.

Here's a closer look at a few key stats.

OWNING INTERLEAGUE: The American League has bested its counterpart in interleague play each of the last four seasons, winning this year's round 137-115. (Since interleague play began in 1997, the AL leads the NL 1,387 to 1,317.)

ALL-STAR ANNIHILATION: The junior circuit is unbeaten in the last 10 All Star games, including the 7-7 "tie" of 2002, when commissioner Bud Selig called the game when both teams exhausted their bullpens after 11 innings. The outrage that followed caused Selig to give the game some weight, which has done nothing to slow the AL down.

WORLD SERIES: Despite owning homefield advantage, American League teams have gone 2-2 since the format change. While AL teams won in sweeps in 2004 and '05, NL teams that went on to win it all won away games to start the '06 and '03 series.

It's worth noting that AL teams have outscored their opponents in each of those years except last year, notching 76 runs to 65 overall.

THE BIG WHAT IF: So let's say "the tie" never happened ... under the previous alternating system, the NL would have had homefield advantage in '04, when the Cardinals could've used it -- they were swept by the Red Sox. But last season, St. Louis made up for it by prevailing without homefield. And the Florida Marlins overcame to beat the Yankees in what would've been a natural AL year anyway, while '05 White Sox took advantage in a clean sweep.

In that sense, the new system appears to have been a wash.

Jonathan Drew is an asap reporter based in New York.