Isaiah J. Downing-USA TODAY Sports
Rangers Feel Brunt of MLB's First Steps to Expose Baseball's 'Dirty Little Secret'
St. Louis Cardinals manager Mike Shildt calls it baseball's "dirty little secret." And we may be getting closer and closer to its full exposure.
Whether it's sunscreen mixed with rosin, pine tar, or "ceramic cement," there is an ever-growing suspicion of pitchers using foreign substances to help them boost spin rates on the baseball. Throughout the game's history, players and coaches have always tried to gain a competitive advantage over their opponent.
As we've been reminded recently with the Houston Astros sign-stealing scandal, sometimes the line between legal and illegal gets blurred.
During spring training, Major League Baseball sent a memo to clubs, detailing its intentions to crack down on the use of said substances by pitchers to manipulate the baseball. Specifically, MLB told its clubs they would inspect baseballs taken out of play, using a third-party lab to check for illegal substances. In addition, they would utilize Statcast data for spin rate analysis.
According to MLB Network insider Jon Heyman, MLB is "alarmed" at the number of suspicious baseballs collected thus far. Heyman also reported that MLB owners planned to "discuss new ways to crack down on foreign concoctions being used by pitchers to boost spin rates" during meetings on Thursday.
Heyman tweeted Thursday afternoon that evidence presented during the meetings showed the issues are "very prevalent" in the game.
The 2021 MLB season has seen its fair share of oddities. Through Wednesday, the league-wide batting average is .236 and the strikeout rate is 24.2 percent, both of which would be records over the course of a season. Not to mention, it only took until May 19 for the league to produce six no-hitters (two of which the Rangers have been on the losing end), which is just one shy of the record for the most in a season.
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While MLB's memo from March stated that players are subject to discipline "regardless of whether evidence of the violation has been discovered during or following a game,” a big league pitcher has yet to see any suspensions or other forms of discipline.
As The Athletic detailed, any discipline handed down from the league would result in pushback from the players union. In turn, the league is compiling as much evidence as possible before any disciplinary action is taken.
But now that threshold has been crossed.
Mason Englert, a Rangers pitching prospect at Low-A Down East, was ejected in the fourth inning of his start on May 30 against Fredericksburg for having a foreign substance detected on his belt. He was subsequently suspended for 10 games beginning on June 1, which is the expected discipline for violating MLB Rule 6.02.
“We support the decision made by Major League Baseball," said Rangers assistant general manager Mike Daly. "This is a learning experience for Mason and will help us to educate the pitchers in our minor league system.”
We have also seen big league umpires become more proactive in searching for foreign substances.
In a contest between the St. Louis Cardinals and Chicago White Sox on May 26, umpire Dan Bellino flagged down crew chief Joe West, who made Cardinals reliever Giovanny Gallegos switch hats after coming into the game with a suspicious spot on the bill of his hat.
Cardinals manager Mike Shildt came out quickly to voice his displeasure and was subsequently ejected. Shildt's postgame rant quickly made the rounds, saying, "This is baseball's dirty little secret, and it's the wrong time and wrong arena to expose it."
(Shildt's postgame comments are timed up, which is worth your time.)
Shildt said that Gallegos wears the same hat all year, which will accrue things like dirt, sunscreen, and rosin over the course of a baseball season. Since it was a day game, Gallegos was certainly wearing sunscreen, which is obviously permitted by Major League Baseball.
"Are these things that baseball really wants to crack down on? No. It's not," Shildt said. "I know that completely first hand from the Commissioner's Office."
Shildt added, "Maybe this is the crescendo for things to come."
Someone who has experience in the Commissioner's Office now resides as the Rangers executive vice president and general manager. Chris Young, a former big league pitcher of 13 seasons, knows there are issues and the league is trying to find out exactly how pervasive the problem may be.
"The extent of the problem, I truly don't know. I don't think anybody really knows that," Young said. "I think that the league is cracking down on these things in part because they are aware of how impactful it has become to our game."
"I know it's something in the last four or five years that has gained a lot of traction from a pitching standpoint," added Rangers manager Chris Woodward. "A lot of guys have seen increase in spin rates. They're able to grip their breaking balls better. It's made a difference from a competitive advantage standpoint. A lot of pitchers feel that way."
That's where the concerns that Shildt outlined come into play — the concerns of pitchers using "concocted substances" to boost spin rates.
In other words, players who are actively cheating.
It's difficult for managers like Woodward and Shildt to police the issue. Once they try to point out an opposing pitcher might be doing something illegal, they put their own pitchers in the line of fire. That's how and why so many have turned their heads the other way for decades.
The lone exception in recent years was when Michael Pineda was ejected for having pine tar on his neck while pitching for the New York Yankees in 2014.
But it seems like all of this might be coming to a head sooner rather than later. And while it may help the integrity of the game, such exposure could give the game yet another black eye.
"I’m not surprised by players looking for an edge any way they can get it," said one Rangers pitcher, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "But I would like the guys who have been doing things naturally and the right way to not be bunched together with the 'he’s good so he must use a substance' crowd."
And that's the slippery slope, just like it was during the steroid era. Once light is shed on the problem, any drastic increase in performance leads to suspicion of cheating. In turn, players become put under the microscope as people watch every single thing they do, turning every pitcher's outing into a witch hunt.
Just recently, the Chicago White Sox television broadcast was openly suspicious of Cleveland Indians reliever James Karinchak after repeatedly putting his fingers on a "dark spot" inside his red glove.
On the contrary, if nothing is done about it, pitchers are then forced to consider cheating to keep up with pitchers throughout the league. Baseball players have their livelihoods to consider. Some guys are looking to get more money in arbitration or free agency. Other guys are just trying to keep a job in the big leagues.
That's why Major League Baseball is trying to clean this up now before it gets out of control. Baseball has had so many scandals, and it wasn't all that long ago we were outraged with the Houston Astros illegally stealing signs in a season where they won the World Series.
Quite simply, the game cannot afford to have another scandal.
While the league has yet to hand down any punishments to big league players, the steps MLB has taken may already be causing pitchers to think twice about doing something illegal to secure a job.
"A lot of guys are scared to use stuff now because they're afraid of what's going to happen if they get caught," Woodward said. "I don't know what the answer is, but I know guys are shying away from it a little bit more now because you're hearing stories of guys getting called out for it."
The Collective Bargaining Agreement between MLB and the Players Association expires at year's end. Don't think the league and its owners aren't considering that with how they handle this situation throughout the rest of the season.
It's a fine line to walk. But like it or not, Major League Baseball is at a tipping point. With how the COVID-19 pandemic was handled, to the lack of progression in CBA negotiations, and now with the sport facing another potential scandal, the next several months are as crucial as they have ever been. The future of the game depends on it.
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