Marwin González Apologizes for Astros' Sign-Stealing Scandal: 'I Feel Regret'

Former Astros utilityman Marwin González opened up about Houston's sign-stealing scandal on Tuesday.

"I feel regret and am remorseful," Gonzalez said, according to USA Today's Bob Nightengale. González currently plays for the Twins after spending the first seven seasons of his career in Houston.

According to Nightengale, González said it's impossible to know whether the Astros would have won the 2017 World Series without stealing signs. 

Gonzalez is the first position player from the Astros' 2017 squad to apologize for the team's cheating scheme following Major League Baseball's report on the operation.

In January, MLB released its findings on the Astros stealing opponents' signs with the use of an outfield camera. Video was fed to a monitor near the club's dugout, where players communicated to the batter that an off-speed pitch was coming by banging on a trash bin. No banging meant the pitch was a fastball.

In the wake of the scandal, Astros manager AJ Hinch and general manager Jeff Luhnow were suspended and subsequently fired. Managers Alex Cora and Carlos Beltrán also parted ways with the Red Sox and Mets for their roles in the scheme as members of the 2017 Astros. Cora served as Houston's bench coach that season, and Beltrán was the team's designated hitter.

Two former Astros pitchers, Dallas Keuchel and Charlie Morton, have also addressed the club's cheating saga at fan fests this offseason. Keuchel, now a member of the White Sox, said it's "not like every game we had it going on."

Morton, a starter for the Rays, said he was aware of the trash can banging during the 2017 season.

"Personally, I regret not doing more to stop it," he said. "I don't know what that would have entailed. I think the actions would have been somewhat extreme to stop it. That's a hypothetical."

Last week, the The Wall Street Journal reported that Houston's electronic sign-stealing operation was first conceived in the front office with the development of an Excel-based application programmed with an algorithm to decode a catcher's signs.