Baseball is set to announce Yankee Stadium as the site of the 2008 All-Star game this week.

Commissioner Bud Selig will hold a news conference at New York's City Hall with Mayor Michael Bloomberg Wednesday. Selig has said since last summer that Yankee Stadium was a leading candidate for the game.

The ballpark, which opened in 1923, is scheduled to close after the 2008 season, and the Yankees will move into a new stadium, being built across a street, the following year.

This year's All-Star game will be at San Francisco, and the 2009 game will be in St. Louis.

No place in pinstripes

Bernie Williams is in an uncomfortable position as a free agent this offseason. He does not want to retire and he does not want to leave the Yankees after 16 seasons. But the Yankees seem to have no use for him.

Jorge Posada, who received an award at the Baseball Assistance Team dinner in Manhattan Tuesday night, said he has kept in close touch with Williams this winter. Apparently, retirement is not an option.

"He's not even talking about that," Posada said. "He said he wants to play one more year."

Posada said Williams, 38, has told him that other teams have called. But with the start of spring training less than three weeks away, Williams has resisted.

"He wants to be a Yankee forever," Posada said. "Hopefully, he gets a chance to do that."

But the only way Williams can return to the Yankees is if he comes to them and asks for a minor-league contract.

New frontier

Much of the the top Yankees brass including club president Randy Levine, general manager Brian Cashman and vice president and assistant GM Jean Afterman are going to China this week.

Why are they going? They will explore opportunities, both baseball and business. They will establish contacts. They will determine the most likely source of future talent and very likely initiate conversations about future working agreements, like the one they have with the Yomiuri Giants in Japan.

After spending a week or so in China, they will visit Japan and their Japanese partners. They are making the trip with the blessing of and under the supervision of Major League Baseball.

By visiting Japan, the Yankees will enhance the globalization of their brand. They already are one of maybe the five best-known teams in the world, and China is untapped territory for Major League Baseball.

Yet before anyone thinks this will become another cash cow for the Yankees, it should be pointed out that they won't directly benefit financially because revenue from any merchandise sold in any country goes to baseball's central fund, whose proceeds are divided among all 30 teams.