2020 - A SEASON FOR IMPLEMENTING ASTERISKS
Games or No Games
This is the year in which our country led other countries in
something no one would ever want to lead - deaths. Over 120,000 Americans died from the world’s
most tragic viral pandemic, COVID-19 (RIP to those souls).
As a result, this baseball season has yet to begin. This past March, cautionary measures were put
into place throughout the United States aimed to lessen the transmission of
COVID-19, including staying at least 6’ away from one another. With that restriction, alone, fans would not
be able to sit or walk near each other, the players would also have to stay away
from each other, and the umpires would have to position themselves at least 6’
from the players and the bases. Many
other obstacles became apparently concerning such as touching the
baseball. For instance, if the virus is
transmittable via touch, how could the players throw the ball after it was
touched by another player? The same concern
is with fielding the ball. Regular
gloves are not made for professionals to grip and complete their expected
accurate throws. (Perhaps that need
could be an idea for inventors and entrepreneurs to consider.)
Recently, some of the restricted measures by well-governed
states had indeed lessened occurrences of COVID-19 related deaths, including
New York State, which originally had, by far, the most incidents. Since March, New York’s stringent
restrictions apparently worked. In
contrast, some states lightened up on their restrictions and have since
incurred increased cases and deaths. Over
the last few months, other sports began considering opening their seasons as
their owners and players worked together.
But, most recently, about half of the United States began having
increased cases of COVID-19, so the other sports began reconsidering their
plans to restart (at least for now).
MLB’s team owners and players’ union also thought about starting
the season, but they did what “they” always do, argue with each other over revenue
and salaries. Their biggest obstacle
became themselves, not COVID-19. Due to
the lack of any peaceful resolution between the two parties, the commissioner
of MLB (Rob Manfred) implemented his right to force 60 games to take place this
season, beginning July 23. Of course,
that condition could (just like the other aforementioned sports) be changed if
COVID-19 gets too far out of hand.
My opinion, which I felt for at least two months, was NOT to
have a season this year. I do not want
teams playing 60 regular season games and then having to play 10 or more games of
that total for playoff games. To me, the
ratio is asinine! Additionally, the
World Series winner would be discredited by almost everyone except the awarded
“Champion Team’s” fan base.
No
matter what happens, THE 2020 SEASON
SHOULD NOW HAVE AN ASTERISK.
Conventional Sign-Stealing in Baseball
Before I even begin talking about the fines & penalties
received by the Houston Astros and the Boston Red Sox over the past few months,
I need to explain what happened back in 2017 with the Yankees and the Red Sox. Each were accused of sign-stealing by one
another. The Red Sox used an Apple watch
to transmit their opposing teams’ signs to the Red Sox players while the
Yankees used the YES Network replays to help decipher patterns. That practice by the Yankees was not
considered an issue with MLB as other teams do that, too. Also, some of the Yankees’ players and
coaches used their bullpen phone as a form of communication from the bullpen to
the dugout in a similar attempt to help decipher pitch patterns. The investigation of the Yankees determined
that the “substance of the communications was NOT A VIOLATION”. In the end, both teams were reprimanded by
the Commissioner and issued a fine. Then,
ALL teams were warned not to utilize any form of electronics or any other unconventional
sign-stealing and, if they did, strong penalties would be implemented including
the loss of draft picks. [Recently, a group of Draft King users have
requested for the secured investigational findings against the Yankees to be
reopened as betting fans are trying to make an alleged case that they lost
money because the Yankees may have had an advantage to win.]
Of course, as most baseball fans know, “conventional” sign-stealing
has taken place by ALL MLB teams for over 125 years. An example would be an opposing team’s third
base coach deciphering their catcher’s signs to their pitcher and, in turn,
immediately sending the batter a signal identifying what pitch was about to be
thrown. Predetermined signals from the
third base coach are then illustrated to the hitter such as the coach touching
his cap twice or turning his body in a certain direction. Conventional sign-stealing is also attempted
without any electronic devices.
VERY UNCONVENTIONAL CHEATING
Remember what I said above?
“ALL teams were warned not to utilize any form of electronics or any
other unconventional sign-stealing and, if they did, strong penalties would be
implemented including the loss of draft picks.”
Well, both the Red Sox (the first team that initiated the cause of the threat)
and the Astros completely ignored that warning and executed very unconventional
cheating. After the warning was issued,
they both used electronics and other means to not only decipher patterns of
pitches, but to also signal the information to their batters in a LIVE
manner.
The Astros, for instance, orchestrated the use of their
centerfield camera to read the opposing catcher’s signals and then communicated
directly to the area outside of the dugout where garbage pails were placed to act as drum instruments. The amount of times the
drums were pounded represented a sound to the hitter to know what pitch was
coming his way. The punishment, after a
very long investigation, was for their manager (AJ Hinch) and General Manager (Jeff
Luhnow) to be suspended for a year without pay.
The team, instead, decided to subsequently fire them. Their Assistant General Manager (Brandon
Taubman) received a lifetime ban. The
Astros were also fined a mere $5 million and stripped of their 2020 & 2021
first and second round draft picks. They
won the World Series that year so many feel they should have been stripped of
their title or, at least, THE 2017 SEASON SHOULD NOW HAVE AN ASTERISK. During the beginning of Spring Training this
year (before the COVID-19 stoppage), opposing teams were drilling them with
pitches.
As for the Red Sox, they also orchestrated the usage of
electronics (in 2018) to transmit live data to their batters even after only 1
year of their previous fine and warning by the commissioner! The details of their wrongdoing were not made
public. They too won a World Series and,
like the Astros received a lot of hate from ticked off players and coaches from
opposing teams and retired players. Many
of them also felt they should have had their title stripped. Instead, they were probably going to receive
a suspension of their Manager (Alex Cora), but they quickly mutually agreed to
part ways to avoid further scrutiny and bad publicity. Their Replay Operator (J.T. Watkins) was
suspended for a year and they lost their second-round draft pick for 2020. During that year, Carlos Beltran was also
involved so the Mets fired him shortly after they hired him to be their
Manager, to avoid any more bad publicity for them. As usual, MLB treated the Red Sox gently –
what a surprise!
Just like the Astros won the World Series in 2017 and was found
in violation, the Red Sox won the World Series in 2018 after being found in
violation. So, likewise, THE
2017 SEASON SHOULD NOW HAVE AN ASTERISK.
In summary of this lengthy article, in the last 6 months between two severe investigation outcomes and the scheduled shortened season there are now 3 World Series Championships that deserve asterisks - the 2017, 2018, and 2020 seasons. You may look at that and see one glimmer of hope, the 2019 season. Well, I hate to disappoint you, but that one is currently in question. That's because the Astros (yes, them again) have been accused by many that they cheated during the 2019 season and especially during the playoffs. In fact, it was during the winning playoff game against the Yankees which incurred the main cause of doubt by many baseball fans (not just Yankees' fans) because the video replay of the winning homerun by José Altuve against Aroldis Chapman became very controversial. As he rounded the bases, he shouted and illustrated to his teammates not to touch his shirt. Once he crossed home plate, scoring the winning run, he avoided his teammates somewhat (like he was a breakable piece of glass) and ignored the broadcaster while scurrying to the dugout to change his shirt before immediately returning to the field for the interview. The video also showed some type of bump under his shirt. Many feel he was wired with cheating devices divulging what pitch was coming!
Wow, a lot of asterisks alongside World Series' notations are needed!!
