Former catcher Erik Kratz recently levied some eyebrow-raising allegations of sign-stealing against a couple of National League teams while a guest with John J. Filippelli and Kevin Sullivan on Curtain Call of the YES Network. When asked for his opinion about the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal, Kratz said, “I can tell you that a team that has been to the World Series often recently, we caught them doing something almost similar.”
Since the Dodgers are the only team to have been to the World Series multiple times in recent years (besides the Astros), it seems Kratz is implying the Dodgers took part in some kind of sign-stealing during the 2018 season. He did not expound any further about their specific actions in this podcast, and did not name the Dodgers directly.
Robert Murray of The Athletic wrote in October 2018 during the NLCS between the Dodgers and Brewers, “There is concern among some Brewers that the Dodgers are using video to pick up their signs,” adding, “Others in the organization are unsure.” That article made clear that the Brewers understood that stealing signs from the dugout or basepaths was fair play, while the use of technology would be crossing a line – the commonly held stance on the issue. Murray reported that the Brewers told MLB’s video room security people of their suspicions, but “The security personnel responded that they had not detected anything.”
On the recent podcast, Kratz made a more specific claim against the Rockies, saying, “…And I can also tell you, cause I don’t really care, I don’t know anybody over there: the Colorado Rockies were doing the exact same thing in 2018…They used to take a Theragun and bang it on their metal bench. And they were doing the exact same thing from the TV. So, there you go. If you think no one else was doing it, you are wrong. The difference is, the Astros may have taken it a little too far.”
Kratz’s point on the whole seemed to be that he thought the Astros were being singled out for actions that were more widespread throughout the game. Certainly, the treatment of sign-stealing as a singular instance of misconduct has been a concern expressed elsewhere. That said, Kratz’s comments are certain to require some follow-up by MLB, given the specific allegations.
For context, Kratz was a member of the Brewers during the 2018 season. The Brewers played both the Rockies and Dodgers that postseason, defeating Colorado in the NLDS and falling to Los Angeles in a seven-game NLCS. He was also a member of the Astros briefly during the 2016 season, prior to the time of the sign-stealing allegations.
Kratz last played in 2020 in a part-time capacity for the Yankees. He made the decision not to play in 2021, presumably ending his playing career. Over 11 years since 2010 when he made his debut as a 30-year-old for the Pirates, Kratz played for nine teams, slashing .209/.256/.355 over 951 plate appearances.
I am not surprised.
Exactly. People acted like Houston was the only team taking advantage of other teams. Rookie mistake. This game has always been about gaining a competitive edge one way or another.
Regardless of whether they are they only team cheating, Houston still cheated their way to a World Series. Cheating/Rule breaking is wrong, no matter how many teams are doing it. It doesn’t make it less wrong. It will taint anything that it accomplished because it was accomplished illegitimatly. Houston got caught, and will have to live with the Taint.
LOL
He’s pointing the finger at the Dodgers who the Astros beat on their field to win the World Series. He’s not the only player who’s said this about the Dodgers lol.
We know that the Red Sox and Yankees were both using a similar system in 2017, the season the Astros were penalized for using that system, because both teams were fined for it and their cheating was the catalyst for the Commissioner’s memo in September 2017. There was no trash can banging in 2018. We know from the report the Commissioner released when MLB penalized the Astros that at least 9 other teams besides the Yankees, Red Sox, and Astros used a similar system of cheating with the only difference being how they relayed the pitch to the batter. According to the report, all the other teams stopped after the memo was sent out in late September and that is why they were not also penalized. If you believe that I have some oceanfront property in Arizona I would love to sell you.
Figured the Astros not being the only team was common sense?
Well, common sense is difficult to find nowadays. The league and fans acted like the Astros disgraced the game as the ONLY cheaters out there. Totally on brand for the MLB, though. Sweep as much under the rug as possible and scapegoat the easiest target(s).
They won an illegitimate World Series thanks to their cheating. Marwin Gonzalez essentially defrauded the Twins because of how much he benefitted. And you want to act like you have some ridiculous persecution complex?? Incredible. Astros would have never beat the Yankees (I’m not a Yanks fan by any means) had not been for the cheating.
Seriously. Yankees only scored 3.2 runs a game. That’s on them. On top of that they were found guilty of cheating and fined an undisclosed amount of money by the league. Currently they have a suppressed email in a legal case that would cause “irreversible reputational harm”. I’m sure that was from too many choir practices?
You don’t find it suspicious the Yankees only scored 3 runs in 4 road games but 19 runs in 3 home games during the 2017 ALCS? If the Astros were “cheating” at home they did a piss poor job of it considering they won the first 2 games by a score of 2-1.
@gtb1 all these teams “cheat” in one way or another and they’ve been doing it forever. You do realize that the coaches and athletes playing the games are human right? The money involved is too great to not try to cheat. The same with the steroid issue. I love when fans say they would never take any form of PEDs. BS you 99.99% would if faced with the opportunity to make hundreds of millions of dollars. The reason more players don’t come out about cheating is because they do it too. Maybe Kratz has never cheated but hey maybe he should have and his career might have been a little more successful than it was. Now he’s on a podcast throwing s#!t at other players and teams.
Read the article knuckle head.
Stros1fan, the Astros cheated. Sid, maybe the Astros would beat the Yankees without cheating, maybe they wouldn’t. Remember: this is the same Yankees team who struggled to score runs at Minute Maid Park during that series.
Baseball is hard when you are not cheating pieces of crap having people bang trash can lids and outfitting you with buzzers. What a ridiculous take.
Baseball is a sport of momentum and if the Yankees score late runs in either games 1 or 2 of the 2017 ALCS and they win all 3 games in New York like they ended up doing, guess what: they win the series. They had a chance despite the cheating from the Astros. Astros cheating to score runs =/= the Yankees bats going cold. It’s ridiculous to think it does. What the Astros did was wrong, but let’s not pretend it’s a 100% guarantee the Yankees would’ve won if there was no cheating.
It’s so shocking that an Astros homer is defending the scumbag Astros.
Sid, you seem angry. Also, give me legitimate factual information on the buzzers? You can’t.
So the ridiculous take should go to you.
Read this slowly so you can comprehend it……..Astros won all of their home games in that series due to cheating. If they lost one of those games despite cheating, the Yankees are in the WS.
I can’t believe you garbagemen are making me defend the Yankees. It’s so gross.
Hey dummy, why do think Altuve freaked out like a pubescent girl when his teammates tried to pull his jersey off with that walkoff HR. You should learn some basic cognitive skills before you clap back.
And I’m not mad. I know that asking people why they are mad is another classic refrain from message board imbeciles.
Read this slowly so you can comprehend: all the Yankees had to do was score late in games 1 or 2 and they couldn’t. The Astros pitching shut them so just score 3 runs and the Astros still win at home if they don’t cheat. You’re proving my point for me: if there was ever a game or two for the Astros to lose at home during that series, it was games 1 and 2. Again: all. the. Yankees. needed. to. do. was. score.
Would they have had to score more runs if you guys weren’t cheating pieces of crap though? Likely not. You are obviously someone who has no integrity and is fine with cheating, so why argue?
And you obviously know me just as well as I know myself. You forget the Astros, despite cheating, scored only 4 runs total between games 1 and 2 with the Astros winning both games 2-1. Are you telling me that the Yankees, the same Yankees who you claim would win if the Astros didn’t cheat, couldn’t drive in just 2 more runs in both game 1 and game 2? The Yankees would have try hard to score because the Astros pitching was on-point at MMP.
Marwin Gonzalez was a 1.5 WAR utility player approaching age 30. His 2018 season with the Astros and his 2019 season with the Twins were similar in value.
It’s not Gonzales’ fault the Twins’ front office wasn’t able to judge his talent level appropriatey.
Oh, dear Lord, we have a buzzer conspiracy theorist among us. Everyone take cover.
Trying to get an advantage has been going on as long as competition has existed. It’s only since the morality police have taken over the world has it become a much larger issue.
The Astros would of beat the Yankees blind folded. Power pitching against power hitting when they were healthy.
Oh dear Lord, the Astros were caught cheating , people got fired and banned for a year, Altuve has never been the hitter he was while cheating, and Astro fans are still defending these clowns. That is what is amazing!
You sure about that? Altuve is hitting .300 right now. Yes, how dare we show gratitude and side with the team who made our city and its people feel great again by winning it all.
Sid Bream –
Who’s to say the Yankees weren’t cheating too? This is a slippery slope your on, and you may find out some things you really don’t like someday….so I’d take it easy on the rhetoric when it’s well known that this was a common practice. A lot of Rockie and Dodger fans have gone silent real fast…maybe the Yankees will be next??
I hate the Yankees. But their pitching may have been even more on point, if one was to assume cheating.
What if the Astros could not score any runs at all without cheating. Why is the onus on the Yankees to score more?
Its as if you are discounting any Astros runs gained by cheating. Which might make no need for the Yankees to score more. I can’t believe I am even explaining this.
Leslie Nielson was a fart machine enthusiast. He collected them, sold them and gave them to cast and crew of movies and TV shows he was on. He would blow takes left and right on purpose to crack people up by using the fart machine. His tombstone inscription is a fart joke, Let Her Rip.
Exactly, Cadagan. We don’t know what would’ve happened.
Can you please provide an article from a reputable reporter about these mysterious buzzers.
Here’s mine:
twitter.com/patmcafeeshow/status/13544957719246929…
@stros1fan the only problem i have with what the stros did was an organizational thing starting with jeff. i’m one of the few that believe in hitch was trying to stop it (you don’t destroy company property without repercussions), and powers above hitch told him to shut up or find a new job. yes i know my point is conjecture and hitch could of been in on it but his actions and attitude tell me otherwise. (btw feel free to rail on me on this and i’ll take any flak that comes my way mute free). now this is just my personal opinion and i could be wrong on it, but i’m okay with cheating as long as it’s on the field of play and both teams have the same chances to cheat, but using tech, home ballpark, and bench guys to give you an edge is going to far. unless your going to give the opposition the same advantages listed above. again blast me all you want but that’s how i feel about what the stros did and also for the next few years they deserve all the crap that fans are gonna throw at them.
The Astros may have cheated but nothing could have helped the Yankees hit a curveball in that series, absolutely nothing. At one point they missed 24 straight. That speaks volumes. You can’t win if you don’t hit the ball.
Sid, that ia the lamest excuse everyone comes up with.So he didn’t want his shirt rippd off and he isn’t the first nor last player not to want his shirt ripped off.
You know Altuve is hitting .300 right now? And he is doing it when the league avg is under.250.
It’s not only the Yankees and Astros. Boston got beat by Houston who looked dominant in that 17 first round. Suspicious yes. In all honesty however so was in hindsight 18 when every button Cora seem to press worked. Other than the relief stints by starters and Benny’s catch am I the only Sox fan thinking it may not have been pure manic? Start with Moreland’s pinch hit HR. A thing of beauty at the time but did he know what pitch was coming even in LA? All I can say is I hope not. Sadly between roads and cheating baseball has a lot of recent questions to look in the mirror at. As long as the money keeps coming in though, any look will be with a closed eye.
Roids
Sid bream is big mad online it’s confirmed. Big mad.
What an edgy, intelligent comment. Your mom says to come upstairs, your hot pockets are ready.
Sid Bream Speed Demon
Marwin isn’t exactly the poster child for the scheme’s success. From May 28 2017 (the date Tony Adams recorded the first substantial total “bangs” when he listened to every game for audio evidence of “bangs”) to the end of the season, Marwin had a .269 average and a .744 OPS at home. On the road in the same time frame he batted .343 with a .985 OPS. It should also be noted that Marwin was the biggest offender, and most active participant of the scheme,
With 136 total “bangs” on record.
Fox741 with a dumb comment.
The years preceding the 2017 season Altuve was a four time All Star, three time Silver Slugger winner, and finished third overall in MVP voting the year prior. Led the American League in total hits three times prior to the 17 season, and won another silver slugger in 2018.
You’re not even touching on the fact that the evidence of Altuve participating in the scheme is weak at best.
They “ won it all” by cheating, my very slow thinking friend. Get a grip!
Yankees were never found guilty of cheating..
Did Marwin hurt the Twins? Or did he pass on Houston’s system in some form?
His first year there (before the scandal broke) the Twins hit an insane number of homers, shattering the single season record. In the years surrounding it, they haven’t come close.
I can remember telling fellow Twins fans at the time, “They have to know what’s coming- pitch and location” because some pretty pedestrian hitters were crushing decent pitching all year long
Altuve, Bregman, and Gurriel are all hitting over .300, and the Astros lead the league in batting avg. They also strikeout the least of any MLB team, as they did in 2017, 2019, and 2020. In 2018 they were second on the list.
You can’t discount how good they are just because you dislike them.
Didn’t AROD play for the Yankees
Old, ever think he was cheating before and after 17? I go back to Bonds and Clemens. Why should I or anyone believe any of their career was on the up and up when I don’t believe they’ve ever been honest on using PEDs?
You don’t find it suspicious that the Astros scored 15 runs in four home games and 5 in three games at Yankee Stadium in that series?
If you’re trying to prove that the Astros didn’t cheat, forget it. They already admitted that they did, in exchange for receiving no punishment from Manfred. This isn’t disputable; it’s MLB history now.
As for the Yankees scoring more runs at home; no, I don’t find it suspicious at all.
Morton pitched the first game at Yankee Stadium, a venue where he historically struggled. He has a 4.95 career ERA at Yankee Stadium, and in his regular season start there in 2017 he pitched to a 6.35 ERA. Will Harris followed Morton and, like Charlie, gave up a dinger with men on. Harris’s ERA in his regular season game at Yankee Stadium in 2017 was 20.25. Some players have a hard time in the friendly confines of Yankee Stadium with a full house. Go figure.
In the second game, the score was 6-4. Close game. Nothing mysterious there. McCullers gave up only one run through 6.1 innings, and then three Astros relievers gave up 4 runs on a sac fly, a ground out, and couple of doubles.
In the third game, the Yankees scored 5 runs — hardly a rout — and Tanaka shut down the Astros. The Yankees hit mostly singles against Keuchel and strung together some hits in the second, third and fifth innings.
Fox
Seeing as Altuve’s 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 seasons resulted in him winning the Silver Slugger Award, him being a better hitter on the road in 2017, and the lack of evidence surrounding his involvement in the scheme, the onus is on you to demonstrate how Altuve “has never been the same hitter he was while cheating”. This should prove very difficult for you.
This has nothing to do with other Astros players. It has to do with your statement in regards to Altuve.
Deweybelongs,
There’s little to no evidence that Altuve participated at all in the 2017 scheme. Why would I believe that, when in a year when most of his position player teammates were cheating and he wasn’t, he would cheat in the years preceding 2017 but not in 2017?
LMAO. The Astros got the system they used FROM the Yankees who were fined in September of 2017 for using that system. If can be argued that the Yankees would not have made it TO the playoffs if not for their cheating.
Sure, man … make stuff up. Beats admitting the truth, right?
Sure , man… make things up (buzzing). Beats admitting the truth, right?
Yes. They were. And received a fine from the league.
Yep, saw it with the PED era. Certain players were exempt from catching crap and some were public enemy# 1. Just like this stuff, the MLB did everything they could to make it look like it wasn’t a league wide issue. Just like ‘roids it will come out that it was a league wide issue.
You bet. And the byproduct of that is they don’t really punish the people doing wrong. So there is no reason players wouldn’t cheat again. So they have and they will.
I still to this day don’t understand how a guy can get popped for steroids and still have his guaranteed contract. I can’t figure that one out.
Exactly jdoo. Look at A/Rod and Papi. Both failed the same test, both used the same ped peddling doctor, both were blatantly obvious.
One got punished and is a black mark on the game. The other is celebrated and will waltz into the HOF.
Typical baseball.
Dude Papi and Arod are seen in basically the same light by fans. I don’t know what you are talking about.
I don’t think ARod and Papi are seen in the same light at all. ARod was demonized. Papi is like a baseball god. I completely disagree with that statement.
Arod was on ESPN last night doing the freaking play by play. So no demonized is not accurate at all.
If you don’t want to use Ortiz as an example, didn’t Bartolo get busted too?
Guys, get the Big Papi story straight please. The only time Papi was ever mentioned taking some sort of banned substance was in the Mitchell Report (along with another 150+ players) where the players volunteered samples prior to any PED rules being in place. The report did not identify what substance each player tested positive for (could have been GNC supplements). After the new rules were put in place, Papi never once failed a test; not a single one. A-Rod on the other hand was caught getting illegal products delivered to him after the rules were in place. HUGE difference here.
You really just proved everyone’s point about some getting a pass while others do not.
I see the Papi/ARod comparison to a degree, but think a better one would be the difference between how Barry Bonds, and Mike Piazza, were treated.
Bonds was the best player of his generation, never tested positive, and testified before a grand jury to never knowingly taking PEDs. But he is barred from the Hall, while Mike Piazza, admitted to PED use, and is a HoFer.
Piazza took the same substance, Andro, that McGwire took. While it wasn’t specifically banned at the time, it was a PED, so that that distinction seems like a technicality. It’s bizarre that the BBWAA would elect one PED user and continually ban another.
That Bonds had a prickly personality, while Piazza was better liked, seems to be the main difference between the two. That shouldn’t be a criterion for the Hall of Fame.
Funny..ESPN is a garbage outlet and has been for years. Look at what is calling games for MLB games and how long it took them to fire the WORST one they ever had in joe morgan few years back anyway?
ESPN should have had games yanked years ago.
@dorothy you make a valid point maybe to valid, also when it comes down to the steroid era in mlb it was a gray era in time there were a lot of “supplements” that fell into the “gray” when it came to being legal in the states but mlb had a loophole. players couldn’t take supplements or drugs banned in the states, doesn’t mean you couldn’t do them in another country and then come back “clean” when st started. now i may be wrong on all of this but mlb’s rules on banned substances in the 80’s to early 00’s is very vague and full of loopholes that lawyers make a living on.
@Joel Peterson I completely disagree too. Papi is beloved but Arod is mostly hated. I do think Arod is worse because he got caught again and is an all around terrible human but Papi gets a pass from most fans. Many have no idea that he even got caught juicing.
You’ve got your story wrong. Piazza never admitted to taking anything except androstenedione. McGwire did:
“The names I don’t remember, but I did injectables,” McGwire told Costas. “I preferred the orals. The steroids I took were on a very low dosage.”
McGwire left a jug of andro in his locker in plain view of the press in the locker room. Meanwhile, he was taking other drugs that were illegal.
But your point about the double standard is well taken. Remember, long before the steroids allegations, the press hated Bonds because he was a surly player who wasn’t friendly to the press. The writers are the gatekeepers to the Hall.
They’re also hypocrites, because they fell all over themselves gushing about the great sluggers in the steroids era and then got all righteous after the scandal blew up.
They just disgraced the game by cheating. .
Lol.
The game has BEEN “Disgraced” since 1994.
They are garbage. All of em.
It’s a baby game now.
Hasn’t been one truly great…not one…player, in over 30 years.
Fields are so short you could toss em out of RF. Every park.
Pitchers? Lol. They stink. When Verlander or Kershaw are considered the “elite of the elite”? (Neither of them was even half as good as Jerry Koosman…let alone in the same stratosphere as a Bob Gibson or Juan Marichal). Today’s “pitchers” (loosest sense of the word applied) aren’t “facing Pete Rose, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clenente, Eddie Matthews, Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Willie Stargell, and on and on and on). And THOSE names…”could HIT the greats”.
Today? Pete Rose? Or Hank Aaron? Would bat .375 and hit 60 home runs a year off of the scrub arms populating the game.
You had me at the word “Disgraced”. Baseball is. Totally.
Ya lost me however…by defending baseball.
Baseball? Needs to be ripped apart and rebuilt. Excising everyone and everything connected to it…since 1994.
BECAUSE since then? It is a AA game. At best.
No more/no less.
Isn’t worth 20 bucks to see a double header and a free T shirt giveaway for the kiddies and 50 cent hot dogs to see this garbage “play”.
Because they don’t play.
They whine. And pocket their uber millions and end up on the DL. (not the IL…But the D…
L. Disabled List is what it is. Again, sissipation of the game).
And dopes keep paying for it?
“There is a sucker born every minute” (PT Barnum).
And baseball knows those suckers are “any drip that shall pay 200 bucks for a family of 4 to watch a team LOSE 20-1 in a park shorter than a Pony League Park).
What’s next? National League getting the DH? Cheapen and suckify the game even more.
Or hey…give em all Metal Bats. Make the excuse behind that BS reasoning that “baseball supports Ocrayzio-Cortez’ Green Nee Deal” and “wants to save trees” by going to metal bats.
Fine baseball fine. Wear a patch about it, why dontcha?
They suck.
Every one of them.
They won the the title for the reason you play the game, world champions. I don’t see anyone giving a turd if the Tigers were cheating all these years. Which is why they probably brought Hinch aboard.
“They won the the title for the reason you play the game, world champions.”
What?
Sure
Houston did disgrace the game. They cheated. I know I never claimed they were the only one. Any other teams cheating are disgracing the game, too.
If you ain’t cheatin’ you ain’t tryin’
One part of the game that needs to be changed!
Steve Nebraska: How many times have you used that same 1 liner? Not hating, just curious.
That ain’t cool, bro.
So…which wife was it anyway?
Yeah.
When the Yanks knew it was happening & didn’t retaliate in the time approved way (a FB in the ribs) that raised some concerns with me over my club. Hey, my coach in JuCo caught a team doing it once (whistling from the dugout) in about a dozen pitches. Interestingly enough, after I threw at a batter, the ump warned them(!).
& this was a 25 year old kid probably getting paid a few thousand bucks. & Boone couldn’t figure it out? That’s…difficult for me to believe, uh?
Chances are this was fairly wide spread.
Yo Bucky, those Yankees of yours are playing some really good baseball as of late.
My man.
What’s good, @ GoAstros?
Yanks have really turned it up since the Cleveland series. Bats finally coming around a bit. Pitching has been fantastic all year though.
You think they’re gonna catch up to Boston?
Yes. I do.
This week, actually.
I like Judge so I hope they do
@goastros123 and ducky i would be shocked if bos beats out tb and nyy, imo (and i dont really follow the al) bos is playing above there heads just like sf and will come back to earth. imo the teams nyy need to be concerned about is tb then tor.
Well, I’ve not seen the sox play this year.
But we are to the point in the year when results are valid.
This year – for example – there was a point when the Yanks had the worst record in the AL while the Royals had the best. That was obviously going to change.
I think the red sox are going to be in it all summer.
Ever since the first base runner reached 2nd base, sign stealing has been in existence.
Geez surprised I am allowed to comment on this……
Baseball will cover this up and bury it under the rug.
I watched the Cubs Cards game last night. 3 plus hours of me thinking I gotta find something better to do. Baseball is lame. Everyone who gets paid off of it(that’s you guys trade rumors) should be concerned.
Baseball has gotten very boring. Strike out or hit a home run. That’s it. No strategy. No excitement.
That’s why you record the games and fast forward the dead periods. I can watch a game in just over an hour and not miss a pitch. Only pro sport I’ll watch anymore. What is lame is NBA and NFL.
You missed some great NBA games if you watched the Cubs/Cards borefest
Well at least those three hours apparently gave you something to whine about.
So you used three hours of a slow game to waste your time. You got what you wanted.
So you have to have 10 runs to enjoy a baseball game? I didn’t get to see the game live, and I saw the box score before watching. I wanted to see Wainwright throw 8 innings of shutout, 1 hit baseball. It was beautiful. Go watch UFC or some crap like that if you lack attention span.
nice take bro even with the dumb extra innings rule was still a great game to watch even if my birds tripped all over there d and let the cubs win. btw to any chc fan that reads this i tip my cap to ya you beat us fair and square and i hope for better results when we play next.
Focus on eternal things . All that matters. You’re right.
tossing pasta at the wall
Blah blah blah
Where are those Dodgers fans demanding the 2017 title?
Nothing has been proven. There was clear evidence against Houston.
Clear evidence? There was a butt hurt player that went to the media because he was left off of the WS roster and some dbag Yankees fan on YouTube. Hardly clear evidence.
Well, that “butt hurt player” and “dbag Yankees fan” provided some awfully clear evidence.
Go do a youtube search. There is incredibly damning evidence of trash can bangs before every off-speed pitch. Plus, the Astros admitted it.
Jomboy did a video of Fiers using pine tar to help throw a no hitter. Also, Fiers has said he plans on keeping his world series ring. He’s not the saint people filled with integrity that people thought he was.
So the Astros owner Jim Crane fired manager A.J. Hinch and their general manager for no reason? Boston did the same with Cora. I bet you’re wishing there was a delete comment button just about now.
Nope because I’m not incorrect.
I’ll give you the opportunity to dig yourself a bigger and deeper hole you’re in. Explain to all of us why the Astros fired they’re GM and Manager, were fined $5M and deprived of their 1st & 2nd round picks in 2020 & 2021 if there was hardly clear evidence? I’ve got my popcorn out …
I think you misinterpreted my comment. There was not clear evidence before the investigation. So, therefore I am not in a hole and not incorrect.
Lol, I didn’t misinterpret anything about your comment. Just admit you misspoke on your original post. Own it, stop blaming people for your mistakes. Btw- MLB is not going to investigate something unless there’s evidence. The investigation just lead to proof of their cheating.
Sure nothing has been proving, ElysianPark, but this certainly raises the posibility the Astros weren’t the only team doing it. They’re certainly not the only team to have ever done it: Hank Greenberg’s 1940 Tigers and Willie Mays’s 1951 Giants both stole signs using technology and relayed them to the dugout who relayed to the hitters, Granted, they used less sophisticated technology and neither team won the series that year.
That’s why the Dodgers are crying because the Astros were better cheaters than the were.
Where is the evidence? I can suspect anything but does it matter or make it a legitimate claim until I actually have proof or at least show reasonable suspicion? If you’re going to make accusations like these back it up. Cowardly to make it vague and not disclose anything. MLB reviewed it and didn’t find anything.
All because this retired mediocre player mentions an allegation against a team and there is an inference that it could be the Dodgers? You are way way premature on this.
Yeah, we’re still waiting for Bellinger to learn how to hit after the league’s crackdown on electronic sign-stealing too 🙂
Chump has a career WAR of -0.1 and nothing better to do. Just trying to make a name for himself.
And if he had 50 million in the bank and was a current player he would never have said a word because he’s worried about losing all that.
You really think he’s liying?????
Exactly. His career is over so he won’t face being blackballed the way it appears Mike Fiers is now other than Oakland. Just because Kratz was a crappy player doesn’t make him a liar.
Sorry kooldewd, I’ll defend Kratz & Fiers till the cans come home.
Kratz spent close to ten years in the minors, working construction jobs in the off season and fought like f*** to get to the bigs. He famously did the opening day face plant for a $2000 dare when briefly on the Astros roster. He also learned enough Spanish to be able to look out for and chat with Latino prospects, arguing that if his kids were in a foreign country he’d want someone looking out for them too.
And without Fiers having the minerals to speak up – do we ever hear about those naughty Houston types, regardless of what Boston or the Yankees were upto?
Fiers also said he plans on keeping his world series ring instead of throwing it away and, if you ask Jomboy, used pine tar to throw a no hitter.
@goastros
That’s a pity – it’d make a hollow ring if thrown into an empty receptacle and have the middle infield buzzing, and tattooing a similar rhythm…
As for the Jomboy pine tar video – yes – as usual he’s spot on, isn’t he?
I just want him to be consistent.
Has nothing to do with it lol
You think honesty and career WAR are correlated?
Didnt help the Rockies much in the NLDS. Brewers whooped their behinds.
The Rockies are so poorly run, they can’t even cheat well lol
American Family Field
^troll
Yeah, the Rockies couldn’t hit at all in that series. Maybe the Brewers were on to it and switched up their signs more often?
MLB has always been somewhat romantic on cheating and gamesmanship. Bobby Thompson’s famous home run was always accused of being the product of sign stealing. Gaylord Perry is celebrated for his antics.
MLB is the definition of the famous line from Casablanca. To paraphrase, I am shocked, SHOCKED!!! to find cheating going on here. Your World Series Ring. Thank you very much, everybody out!!!!
Gaylord Perry wrote a book about it while he was still pitching didn’t he?
I guess it depends on the method. I think what the Astros did was egregious. Sign stealing in itself is likely very common, but using cameras and/or trashcans seems totally outrageous and the majority of players in the league felt that way too. So if the Dodgers did something on the Astros level, then sure, it’s a huge scandal, but as of now all we have is some dude making random accusations.
Even if the Dodgers did do it so what???? Astros were caught cheating. Do you think they learned their lesson? I dont…..
So only an issue if the Astros did it, but not the other teams?
If the Dodgers did anything remotely close to what the Astros did, I have a huge problem with it. But let’s be real, the Astros barely got a slap on the wrist.
If you using technology then its an issue … if its a guy at 2nd watching the catchers glove then no i dont have a problem with it. You should be switching up signs for that.
My point is so what if they did do something similar to what the Astros did. They won’t get punished for it, not in a real and meaningful way that will make them consider not doing it again. And thats why it will continue to he a problem moving forward.
Integrity in sports is becoming a joke. The NHL still has some but the rest of these leagues are a total joke selling out to a dollar at the drop of a hat.
They barely got punished because it is a league wide issue. And a $50MM fine, suspension of a great coach/GM, loss of 4 picks is a pretty substantial punishment for the team. Thank the union for the players not getting anything.
Saying it’s a league wide issue is a complete cop out. And no taking draft picks away while letting the championship stand is not a substantial punishment. Its not a real deterrent to keep someone from doing it again and that’s how punishment is supposed to work.
I think the Astros were punished with a slap on the wrist because MLB already knows it’s a league wide thing. MLB acted like they were forced to punish the Astros but made the punishment light cause they know they’re just the only ones that got caught. MLB would have a HUGE problem on their hands if word came out that every team was cheating. The sport would die.
$5M fine but that was the maximum allowed under the MLB bylaws.
I will never understand why banging a trash can is so different than apple watches, massage guns or any other form of sending the info to the batter. If you really think they decoded the signals and then didn’t communicate them I just don’t even know what to say anymore…
It’s because the person banging on trashcans was using technology to steal the signs and then banging on the cans to relay the message.
Yes, and that’s why the Red Sox were fined in 2017 for using an Apple Watch and why Manfred issued his memo on 09/15/2017.
Cubs were doing the same sort of things in the late 60’s with the cameras.
Sorry Rockies, you’re not as prominent as the Yankees, so you can’t just let your accusations magically go away after two weeks. Sucks to be a small market team.
It’s not a coincidence that the Astros front office (the one that cheated, not the current one) was hated league-wide before the scandal. And that the Rockies’ front office is laughed at. The Dodgers, on the other hand, are well respected and thus they don’t get named.
I’ve watched the Dodgers pretty closely for years now, and there are definitely moments when it seems fairly obvious they know what’s coming (for the record, I have no direct evidence but am an ex-ballplayer and you develop a second sense for that kind of thing). However, I very much doubt they’re banging on trash cans or benches or anythign like that. I suspect they’re doing something more sophisticated like using video and AI processors to find tips in pitching delveries, and from there letting hitters do the rest.
Not a coincidence at all. They got Verlander, Cole, and Alvarez (among others) for peanuts and turned (or returned) them into MVP contenders. If hate the FO that could consistently do that too.
Not to mention Morton. Just imagine if the Pirates had the ability to get the most out of the talent they had in house, and not just give away Glasnow, Meadows, etc.
IOW, not sign stealing at all?
hahahaha
So you watch the Dodgers pretty closely for years and there are DEFINETLY moments where it seems fairly OBVIOUS that they know what’s coming??
So how about back up this DEFINETLY OBVIOUS proof that you have so keenly watched closely.
You are a fool and should really STFU………or put my in my place and prove what you said.
Lmao. You know that they know what’s coming??
Or they have run out historic pace offenses for the last 2 years and really good teams can make it seem like they know what’s coming when they’re hot
All this comes down to is a retired player repeating never-proven accusations(including his own employer saying they found no evidence of cheating in this capacity)… so he can try to make some money repeating conspiracy theories on the radio for a few weeks
He sounds bitter the better team won and he doesn’t even have the nuts to actually name the dodgers. This is the biggest non story to get 250 comments here in a long time
If it’s a non story why worry enough to come in and comment? It will go away on its own.
Sign stealing is very common. Every team does it. If done right, it is perfectly legal. The only thing we don’t know is how many teams have done it illegally.
Some forms are legal, some are not. But the bottom line is, do you want to spend 3.5 hours watching a game that will be determined by something you can’t see and has nothing to do with the players (i.e. who’s stealing signs better)? I don’t.
Here’s a list of everyone who cares what Erik Kratz has to say:
obviously Fire Jon Daniels cares because they read the article and actually commented on it.
I care! EK is a high character guy, I trust what he sys. Old lunch bucket was one of my favorite Brewers! He has as much cred on this site as anyone! I trust him with anything of mine!
Erik Kratz has an impeccable reputation among teammates, and he had a lot of them. He is respected and was a valuable back-up catcher, never having a problem finding a job. When with the NYYs, he was better than Sanchez.
i guess the attached excel file with all the names was too big that it failed to add.
It was obvious MLB wanted to sweep it under the rug, but thanks to all the media attention they had to get a fall team and the Astros were the perfect one since their use was so blatant. Red Sox got in trouble, but look how quiet theirs was.
It gets worse. Baseball tried to scapegoat Beltran and Cora in a weird racist way.
I’m surprised it took this long to play the race card.
I am a 40 year old white guy. Odds are you are a middle aged white guy too. Latinos are all over the game in 2021 they make up half the league. We were FINALLY starting to see some managers being hired and first chance baseball got it threw those guys under the bus. Racism is real. I wish it wasn’t but it is.
If you’re saying MLB used these 2 Latinos as scapegoats for this cheating scandal than how about the 2 white guys who got fired as well. I’m Latino and to say MLB is being racist with regards to the Astros verified cheating is why you Woke people need a life.
They found 2 Latinos out of very very few in the game and those guys were put on blast as the face of what went wrong. It was totally lame if you didn’t see it or notice it fine. But it was lame. Hinch was the gosh darn manager of course he should have been blamed. But Cora and Beltran got extra blame in a weird way.
The real issue here was Cora and Beltran were the alleged masterminds behind the cheating so of course they needed to be terminated. Unfortunately MLB agreed to immunity for the players so the executives, managers and coaches were fair game for disciplining. Personally it’s a disgrace that all of them are allowed to be employed by MLB again. They should have suspended them for life. Manfred is such a weak commissioner.
The Union protects the players. If this story goes any further the union will do the same for the Rockies players and any other future player. Get yourself a job with a union and you’ll eventually find out how hard it is to get fired.
Beltran wasnt even punished, just mentioned. its very possible if he wasnt let go of the MLBPA would have blocked any sort of punishment.
People forget that to steal signs, you first have to accurately decode the signs. And there has not been anyone in our generation, maybe ever, better at that than Carlos Beltran.
But not Hinch or the GM
Gotcha!!
Racist!!!
And the Red Sox found a fall guy.
Did you read the commissioner’s report? The commissioner investigated the 2018 Red Sox for months – emails, video, people interviewed multiple times – and not one incident of cheating could be documented. There was no proof that even a single at bat was affected. MLB could only conclude that the Red Sox “may have benefitted” and “potentially benefitted” from Watkins’ theorized actions while also saying they “largely do not have direct evidence” against Watkins. In the absence of evidence, MLB made some “inferences” otherwise known as guesses. JD Martinez was correct when he said they didn’t find anything in Boston. The Dodgers and Yankees are also innocent until proven guilty.
Consistency is important in baseball. MLB tries to sweep everything under the rug. Most bazillion dollar organizations do.
I knew they did. I also think the Braves did a little too. One day they hit Degrom very hard and it was obvious!
Let me fix your comment…
“I knew they did. I don’t think the Braves did any though. One day they hit Degrom very hard and it was obvious he was just having a bad game.”
Or they had figured out a tip and DeGrom fixed it the next outing vs the Braves. That sort of thing happens constantly. SO many major league games are decided by one pitcher tipping his pitches. I think many baseball fans would he shocked.
That’s probably what happened
One day? Just because deGrom had an off day doesn’t mean anybody cheated. Bad days happen to even the best pitcher in the league (which he is). deGrom has destroyed us other then that.
It wasn’t just a bad day lol. What are the chances every ball you guys hit that day was 100 mph.. I made a mistake to assume you guys cheated. Maybe Degrom was tipping his pitches. But Ik for a fact you guys knew what was coming.
Cole, Bieber and Mad Max (my favorite all time pitcher.) All get lit up occasionally as well, it doesn’t matter if you are throwing 100 if you can’t hit your spots. Maybe deGrom was tipping his pitches, who knows maybe the Braves were stealing signs but we shouldn’t make assumptions about any team without evidence.
Metsfan22 that is a bonehead comment Degrom isn’t superman he can have bad outings to….
Dude, just stay out of the conversation. I’m a Mets fan too but they and what may or may not have happened to deGrom have nothing to do with this conversation. Your fanboy passion doesn’t allow you to let one topic go by without someone tying it back to the Mets
Happens all the time with Metsfan22.
more excuses!
deGrom is the best pitcher in baseball, but he’s been rocked by divisional opponents before. The Phillies rocked him in 2020 in a start that probably cost him the CY Young. It isn’t about cheating. It’s about facing the same lineup multiple times in a short span. Sometimes it’s hard for a pitcher to mix things up enough in those types of games. Even the best in the game, which deGrom is by far, is going to have off nights once in a blue moon. You can’t just cry cheating.
I don’t have a problem with allegations if your going to back it up with specifics like Kratz did with COL but don’t throw shade at other franchises unless your going to provide some sort of detail.
Do you honestly think if the commissioner asked him privately he couldn’t provide more details????
I bet he would LOVE to do that. But the commish isn’t calling. That my friend is the issue here understand that.
You are on the target 100 percent!
No reason not to provide detail if you are going to make a public statement. If you are going to implicate LA then tell us what they did like he did with COL. If you want to practice passive agressive speculation then do an interview on a cable news network.
No reason not to provide details? That’s nonsense. He knows they cheated. And so does MLB and they let it go with a slap on the wrist. It’s not on Erik Freaking Kratz to fix cheating in baseball it’s on baseball. If MLB actually cared enough to fix this issue he’s not shooting his mouth off.
He’s the one making the accusation not MLB. Least not publicly. I’m not defending MLB on the issue at large I’m criticizing Kratz for not substantiating one of his claims.
Sooooooo why not just put it out there to the media then if you are going to accuse the Rockies and Dodgers.
If you are man enough to throw those two teams out there are cheaters, then you should provide facts, specific games so others can go through video, etc.
Otherwise, it really just is high school girl drama.
Even though this is a crucial point and very telling, I refuse to hate any team other than the Astros, bc I am from NYC (yanks babay!), I’m 5’8, and I talk louder than I should so I dare any Astros fan to try and bring this point up to me.
Yankees fans who were taunting Altuve on his birthday went very quiet after Altuve hit that home run. If you’re gonna taunt, go for it. However, do it even when the Astros are winning because otherwise you come off as a bunch of loudmouths who quit when the going gets tough.
WOW CAN’T BELIEVE THIS !!!!
GIVBE MATT KEMP MVP !!!!!!
Dodgers STOLE their 2020 Mickey Mouse title. Should be the Yanks.
Evidence? I think the Dodgers beat my favorite team fair and square, I wasn’t happy about it of course but I’m not gonna assume a teams guilt of a pretty serious allegation based off of one person’s account.
They would of still had to beat MIKE BROSSEAU and ALTUVE to get there. Cry in a corner
That’s funny. I don’t remember the Yankees being the AL representative in the the World Series in 2020. That was the Rays who have beat up on the Yankees in recent history with less than 1/3 the Yanks payroll.
Simple solution to end all this stupidity – and speed up the game while we’re at it. Mic up the pitcher and catcher so one just calls the next pitch to the other. No more signs = no more sign stealing. No more signs = no more shaking off signs = quicker pace of play. Two birds, meet one stone.
Better yet just have the catcher have a 2 or three button emitter and have the pitcher keep a receiver on him. Complete silence like Morse code.
Wouldn’t the hitters hear that?
Not if you use code words
Catcher: Foxtrot Unicorm Charlie Kilo
Hitter: wtf does that mean?
Pitcher: change-up inside got it
They all do it in some way. It’s just the really stupid ones who get caught.
If this is true it’s horrible. Considering my team was up 3-1 in the nlcs and probably should’ve won against the dodgers. Certainly explains how the dodgers destroyed their pitching
That AND the Dodgers were a WAY better team.
As a fellow braves fan don’t just take one person’s word as fact.
Maybe don’t make an estimated 247 outs on the base paths next time?
I’ll trust the technicians who didn’t see anything suspicious over the claims of this scrub player. He comes across as petty and bitter with baseless accusations that even he says others on his team and people who worked for his team’s organization found baseless.
Sounds like Mike Fiers.
What I should’ve said is this: “If Katz is petty and bitter, he sounds like Mike Fiers. Fiers turned out to be right so maybe Katz will too”.
The obvious difference here is that Fiers actually played for the team he accused when they were cheating. Kratz is just throwing out unsubstantiated and unspecific accusations against a rival team that even the technicians for his own team and, apparently, many of his own teammates did not support.
And Fiers was a hot head who was left off the Astros world series roster in 2017. Fiers also said he plans on keeping his world series ring. He clearly was not petty and/or bitter. If it turns out Katz is telling the truth, will you then turn around and applaud him for speaking up?
You certainly have no bias on this topic, Astros fan.
You do realize its possible to have bias against something too, right? No, I’m not saying you’re biased against the Astros nor am I trying to imply you are. I’m just curious about what your response would be. According to some fans on this page, Kratz has a good reputation. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but if it is, it’s possible there is truth to his accusations. After all, I don’t believe a player with a good reputation would make up something like this. Then again, maybe I’m naive due to my Austism. Objectively speaking, we just need to wait for more info.
I’d file a defamation lawsuit unless he provides specific details. Players just “saying” stuff about teams “players” is no different in my book then defaming an individual.
Lol you serious?
If the Dodgers organization sued him it would force Kratz to testify under oath. I bet you anything the Dodgers don’t want that to happen. Why?
Because he’s telling the truth……..
Erik…Kratz…has a podcast?
What’s next? “Pete Vuckovich is hired as the recurring-guest star on Mystery Date: The Game Show”?
Talk about the biggest “WGAF” non-story to emerge since The Pirates DFA’d the ToadScrubber 2 weeks ago? This is it.
Lol. “Sign stealing” is now the baseball equivalent of “I need a safe space because someone hurt my feelings”, and baseball team’s latest excuse to hide behind “not winning”.
Wanna keep your signs from being ‘stolen’??
Create…better signs.
Quit whining you overpaid .209 hitters. And learn how to play the game.
Then…you won’t need so many “signs”.
Maybe “bunt, swing away, take, steal” and that is it.
But if you’re truly worried that “mister 4.69 era on the mound up there throwing “curveball grapefruit or slider grapefruit” is truly going to make a difference? Lol.
Maybe try to stop throwing grapefruits.
Just sayin.
But hey…Erik Kratz…has a podcast.
Let me know when you get a podcast fella. Because comments like yours are quite transparent.
Will do.
Am sure you will learn something, lightweight.
But I will certainly remind myself to truly care what you think…someday, maybe in 2094
He was a guest on a YES Network podcast.
I guess Erik Kratz has a podcast. Have you listened, or are you basing his ability to do the job on something else?
Is he bad or something?
I dont get your vitriol, unless you were supposed to be humorous.
There are signs whether a player is a hof or not. And of course, teams try to obfuscate their signs. Just as society tries to prevent theft. Most people would say the rule breaker or theft is to blame, not the victim.
Naive to think your team is innocent. All teams covertly engage in illicit ways to gain an edge.
Nailed it
It is hilarious. I’m sure these are the same sort of fans who think their favorite player in the 90s was not juicing, regardless of legit whispers.
I wish my favorite 90s players were juicing. They all sucked.
They may all be doing something, the problem is when there is a major degree of coordination and of course when they get caught. Sure, a handful players will always try to figure out the signs and share them with others, the figurative line is crossed when they start using technology (which is banned) and employing others outside the 25 man roster to “steal” and communicate the signs. There is gamesmanship and there is being just a bunch of Astros
Kratz is well respected amongst his peers and obviously isn’t looking for clout at this point so it’s definitely interesting to hear his comments on this. I have a feeling he’s going to be elaborating more on this going forward.
Kratz is a cheater….don’t believe a cheater
I bet you still believe T
Snitches get the stitches
They actually never, ever do.
Maybe not where you’re from, but I’ve seen grown men screaming while getting their teeth knocked out.
You really think that makes you sound tough? Maybe you just have a sadistic dentist
The Commisioner won’t take the responsibility of adding all of this technology and thinking the players weren’t gonna tweak it to their advantage.
” I wasn’t relevant as a player but I’ve got this idea to grab a lot of publicity and maybe even make some bank from “”exclusive interviews””…… Kratz’s new life description seems to be “Slimy Tool”. What a pathetic puke. Either man up and speak the plain truth or put your skirt back on and crawl back under your rock.
yeah, sounds like you made that quote up.
The Astros absolutely stole signs last playoffs too, especially against Oakland. I think they have staff in Oakland helping them too.
How do they beat up on only the best team, but then get cooked by terrible teams immediately after? Makes no sense, their top 7 hitters are all mashing at once, that doesn’t happen to any other team – gotta be stealing signs.
Sarcasm?
the A’s barely got out of the 1sr round last year, and if the Sox would have had a better manager they probably wouldnt have. Melvin’s postseason track record speaks for itself. and it’s bordering on lunacy to say both teams were in on it.
Time to take away that fake WS trophy. Stupid cheating dodgers.
Can’t throw rocks from a glass house brother. Preller is one of the most suspect gms out there. Shipping injured players in trades and withholding medicals. Don’t be surprised when your little fairytale comes crashing down, as of right now this is second season in 15 years in which you might make playoffs.
I always find it humorous when “respected amongst ones peers” (I guess Mendoza Line hitters have lots of peers) seem to know “all there is to know about sign stealing…yet can’t hit a straight fastball, down the middle, off a 4.50 ERA scrub arm.
Perhaps if Kratz worried more about the “ol #1″ just 10 percent more of the time, across an entire year? Then perhaps he would not be a nondescript .209 hitter ‘who is well respected among the Tom Prince or Jeff Mathis or Chris Stewart crowd”…all those years.
But…”the world loves a rat” (well respected by his peers too)
Write a book Erik. All teams do this.
BUT…he is “well respected by his peers”
(Good. Glad he is. .209 hitters can hang OVER THERE. Cause ballplayers? They ain’t)
Actually Phoenix I believe your reasoning supports the counter argument. If his production was not good enough to keep him in professional ball for 2 decades then something (like peer respect) did.
Additionally, the playing career of most coaches and managers in most cases resembles Kratz’s career and not a MLB all-star. It probably unlikely that you will be given much of a chance as a coach or manager if you don’t have the respect of your peers, whoever they may be.
No. What “kept Kratz in the majors so long” is a complete lack of talent…across the board.
The man would make 6 starts and be DFAd and replaced by Bob Uecker in the 1960s.
Things (in terms of player ability) are that bad in MLB.
It is more like the WannabeMLB these days.
Cliff em all
No, Kratz’s offensive numbers clearly weren’t good enough alone to keep him in the Majors. Let’s not forget that he accumulated less than 1,000 plate appearances in over 11 MLB seasons. He was primarily a backup with no bat and more defensive attributes. The context here is his lack of hitting. My beef is that he is vague but not vague enough and provides no detail, which I basically see it as an empty accusation thrown at the Dodgers. Bitter much for losing? Classless.
And I can assure you that no team did something “almost similar” as the Astros, or else we would have heard it by now. The Astros got direct video feed in home games of every pitch and communicated that type of pitch (fastball vs offspeed) to the batter. They had to ask someone internally to provide that illegal video feed, and use that illegal feed to their advantage. My guess is many teams study past signs for opponents and use legitimate in-game video feed that was previously legal and somehow figured out sign patterns and tried to communicate those signs when they had runners at second base. Meaning the runner at second base trying to give a sign to the batter this is after seeing what the catcher puts down. Not a lot of time and runner at second has to know what is going on. And of course catcher and pitcher can always switch sign pattern.. If that was the case, I’m sure that the Dodgers, if even they did that, were not the only ones doing it and perfectly legal under the rules of the game. All this too in speculation with no evidence provided. See the big difference? Sometimes also catchers get paranoid and think batters are stealing signs because pitchers are getting whacked and seems like batters know what’s coming. Stupid stuff.
Thank God for that. Jeff Mathis is still unhappy though. “If only…THE Erik Kratz could have gotten just a couple hundred more at bats? Then he assuredly-would have batted about .190 lifetime”.
Every pitch? Lol
They played better on the road than at home in 2017.
Every home pitch. Yes, that’s how it went down. Justify cheating much?
It wasn’t every pitch at every home game. There’s plenty of research out there if you want to take the time to read and study it. They didn’t even start the trashcan banging scheme until late May and appeared to have stopped after Danny Farquhar became suspicious on September 23rd. There’s also plenty of articles out there that despite cheating it had a negligible effect on overall results. Getting the wrong sign is much more harmful than getting the right sign. This is not defending the cheating though. It’s just facts.
How does a .209 hitter last 10 years, he is well respected and a good team mate. and a leader.
Based on these comments, the accusations against the Dodgers are broad and vague, but should be investigated and may take a while.
His accusation against the Rockies is pretty specific, though, and could be investigated pretty easily. When the big Astros story broke, people investigated the trash-can banging and pretty quickly found video/audio evidence of it. Wonder if they could do the same for this. Banging something routinely on a metal bench could be picked up on a broadcast.
Baseball brought this (and every other problem it has) upon itself.
Wanna take away the “you stole my sign” garbola?
Then move those fences back 30 feet again…raise the mound, and get .209 lifetime hitting scrubs (like Kratz et al) out of the game.
Fences back where they should be? He would hit .109.
Why? Because he was a “one trick pony”.
Sure. He could catch the baseball.
But it isn’t called “catchball”.
It is called Baseball.
To which…the art of getting on a base has been so-diminished that the game is now rife with these overpaid hacks…who could not hit a pitched baseball from the hand of a Bob Gibson, Sandy Koufax, Warren Spahn or Juan Marichal.
Not…ONE of them.
The game is a cheap version of itself.
Commish is a knee taker anyway.
He doesn’t care about anything relevant to the game, except making ludicrous changes to “its tempo” and by allowing “a standing runner on 2nd base to start an extra inning”.
Could the game become any MORE sissipated?
Nope.
But “Oscar the Grouch banging on his trash can lid to say Curveball coming”…is going to make a difference? Lol.
Game is a joke
Are you saying the fans should bust the players? I think that’s what you said.
The fans should BOYCOTT the players, is what I am saying.
Not one player…NOT ONE…in the entire game is “worth paying to see”.
And by paying sub-mediocrity garbage? Only brings the consumer…more of the same.
Even worse than before.
And it will get worse. Much worse.
No amount of “rule changing/makin-it-fair changes/fence shortening/ball juicing…whatever can take away from this one inalienable fact.
Baseball players of today? Suck.
Across the board.
They are built like balsa wood. Play with the intensity of balsa wood. And perform like dead wood.
They are “AA grade players of 1978” is what they are.
Even the “below average players of that era”…were better than the “considered-elite” of this one’s.
Game is a joke
I have to give it to you Phoenix for someone who despises the state of the professional game and doesn’t watch it anymore you have a LOT to say about it on a weekly basis. You’re a super non-fan!
That I am my friend. That I am.
Folks always ask me “when you gonna talk about baseball again”…so they trot me out and ask.
My reply is always (and will always-remain) the same as it has been for the past 30 years.
The game is a dumpster fire.
Watered down P***y game now.
As the old saying goes:
“It sure ain’t your grandfather’s Oldsmobile anymore”.
Which is sad too. Because the way “baseball” is going? They will be “Oldsmobile” faster than we know it.
Obsolete. As baseball has done its own damage…to itself.
Kids don’t care no more. Players? Lol. Thet3 only care about 1 thing. (And it isn’t “being a ballplayer”).
Owner suck. Fields are too short. Pitchers aren’t even AA caliber anymore. “Go 5 innings, give up 4 runs and get a statgeek stat” to go to arbitration with, so they can “get a raise” for being pathetic.
I hate em. All.
What you truly need good sir, is some of those old timers to speak up and say “shut your face kid. Not only could you NOT even “take my job” back then…but you wouldn’t even MAKE the team back then. Backup outfielders and mop up men back then had more talent than anything of today . period”
Thusly…you are correct. This game sucks. And I hate it anymore. A game I have loved and played, and been around for 40 years…is dead.
As a doornail.
why is the immediate reaction always to blame the player in question? what’s enough clout and enough dis-connection from the cheating for it not to be relevant.
Immediate reaction to blame the player, in this case, is because people as fans don’t want to admit what they are watching is a fraud. Nobody wants that.
The whole game is a fraud.
What game have you been watching since 1995?
Sure as heck ain’t baseball.
More like wussball.
A watered down “ColecoVision” style of quasi-baseball that an ape could play.
And with each passing year, the “powers that be”…cheapen and lessen the game, even more.
Pretty soon? You may as well sign softball players to play it.
Because with the state of “pitching” the way it is anyway (and most players still can’t hit it)…you may as well employ softball pitchers to throw em. (Or lob em). At least they can throw (lob) it for a strike.
Game is a bigger trash can than the ones the Astros used to (cough-gag) “steal a world series”.
I always laugh at this. As it wasn’t as if the oppo was chucking pellets up there at 99 mph/at the knees/impossible to hit pitches…nor forkballs or 12/6 curves that snap off a foot.
No.
How hard is it (truly) for a professional “baseball player” (quotation usage intended) to hit a fastball?
For these colossal bums? Apparently…very hard.
They could steal EVERY sign in the world off of a Greg Maddux or Steve Carlton or Bob Gibson type…and he would still defeat em. Every time.
Baseball is akin to a “let’s make parity/socialism/everyone gets a trophy” now…more than any other game.
Rotten. To the core.
Cliff em all.
And rebuild it. Again.
You just know that somewhere…likely in Seven Springs or mid way up the Rotunda in Left Field, PNC Park…that Bob Nutting is asking himself…
“Whom can I pay to steal more signs? Maybe then…we could actually find a way to win 70 games? Ben Cherington…look into that please. We don’t need baseball players. We need more signs stolen! That’s the ticket, yeah! After all…we ARE The Pirates. Don’t pirates steal things? Things like signs? No Ben…I don’t mean road signs. But if we could just get our quasi-hitters to know when a 91 mph fastball is coming, right down the middle…then we COULD re-sign ToadScrubber, Erik Kratz, Saint Sean de Rodrigue’ and Pedro Whiffarez. With some luck? They may close eyes/swing and run into 15 more victories for us”.
Catchers should use cubic polynomials. The first sign is the independent variable, the next three signs are the coefficients in standard descending order and the last sign is the constant. So 2, 3, 1, 1, 2 would cube 2 and multiply by 3, square 2 and multiply by 1, multiply 2 by 1 and add 2 to get the dependent variable of 32. Add the digits to get 5 and you throw a knuckle slurve change up sidearm pitch. Easy as pi.
Catchers could use Egyptian Hieroglyphics…have JJ “DynoMite” Walker out there with airline directional flags…and employ Marconi to dit dit dit…dash dash dash the signs into Cape Race and it won’t matter one hill of beans.
Players are gonna steal signs until the end of time IF they can.
I did as a player. You did too (if you were a player).
That is why they are called “signs”. You always were taught to “read for the Indicator”. Always taught to “hit ball where pitched” from Little League thru College to Minors to Semi Pro and even the good ol beer leagues now.
It is HOW THE GAME IS PLAYED.
And if pitchers didn’t suck more than Mrs. Jack Rabbit on a date, these days? They wouldn’t need them.
Because “today’s hitters”? Couldn’t “hit” their way out of a wet paper bag.
Sad thing is? Not only do the hitters…supposedly-PROFESSIONAL HITTERS (lol)…stink on ice.
But the pitchers are even worse.
A monkey could hit today’s pitchers.
They don’t pitch. They simply “throw’ and “flail” and ultimately fail.
The game sucks.
And I do not care what THE Erik Kratz says.
He was barely even a player. A nondescript hack who couldn’t “play” on our 50 and up league these days.
Why? He cannot hit. At all.
And simply “squatting down…catching a pitched baseball and 26 percent of the time MAYBE throwing out a runner. Mind you, this isn’t “Omar Moreno nor Billy North nor Tim Raines nor Rickey Henderson” he is “throwing out”.
(More like Miguel Cabrera). Who couldn’t “outrun a house fire”.
Thusly…Erik Kratz? Just shut up.
No one (especially me) cares what you think…nor what you think you know.
Because you hit like Helen Keller.
Come back and tell us all something we don’t already know when you found a real job?
Oh…you need one?
Good. Come work for me. Your hired.
But with one caveat. If you SUCK 80 Percent of the time, as you did across 11 seasons in baseball?
I will fire your ass in 11 minutes.
And you will keep your mouth shut.
Why? Because business is business and baseball should be baseball.
The way you played it? Makes any AA guy I know proud to know that he is 1) better at any facet than your scrub ass is. And 2) know that “all they gotta do to MAKE it to whatever the hell “today’s Bigs” is? Is become a political sellout punk.
That’s it. Fort Pitt
They used to play World Series in under two hours. It wasn’t unusual. Now you have 3 and a half hour bore fests night after night. Really, who cares if they cheat? I’m not watching any more. The modern game stinks.
WA HA HA HA HA HA
Only “sign” needed in today’s game? With its garbage pitching and fields so short, that HS team fields are deeper? Is a sign…given to Mendoza Line hitting scrap (like Kratz) that is the sign of a billboard that is taped to his knees…reaching dugout to dugout and reads:
“THROW BALL HERE DUMMY”.
The rest is cream cheese.
Giving these teams too much credit in saying “we really really REALLY gotta steal the sign off this pitcher w the 4.77 ERA?” Tells ya all ya need to know about how godawful the talent level is anymore in the Major Leagues.
You never heard Willie Mays nor Roberto Clemente nor Hank Aaron saying “whaaaa! We wost becawwwse someone stowwwe Wawwwen Spawwwns signs. Whaaa”.
Never.
Why? Because THEY were baseball players.
Today’s “things in uniforms”? Are less interested in being baseball players…and more interested in making excuses for their failures to not be.
of course kratz will single out the dodgers, he is so sour that his team didn’t win. well buddy, the red sox also cheated in 2018. if the dodgers had cheated, they would have won too. But that didn’t happen, did it???
Nailed it.
Kratz is somewhere now…reveling in his knowledge-knowing that ‘FINALLY…after all these years, hitting worse than a PITCHER…someone truly cares what I think” Yay/rah…I gotta call Mom”.
Erik Kratz. THE Erik Kratz (if he was a “university” would be announcing it like that during the “MSU versus KratzU Hit .200” team)…that is now.
No one cared what he (never) did as a “player”. Maybe his “second life as a big mouth/wanna be Bob Costas type” is in his making?
Costas is about as “capable with a bat as Kratz was”…so those “peers” oughta have lots to talk about.
(Word to the wise…err I mean “THE Erik Kratz” though, when you go to work with KneelinBobby?
Talk fast. Cause Costas never shuts up.
But he WILL (happily) tell you…for hours on end, how well he “knew Willie Mays and how wonderful it was watching Bob Feller and Ralph Kiner…and that The Gashouse Gang were his favorite team and blah blah blah” (I never realized Costas is 100 years old! Man he looks great for a guy who has lived so long and seen so much.
It is called “The Walter Mitty Complex”. (And Kratz n Costas could have a wonderful show, built around embellishment and crap they know ziltch about…yet get paid. Things like Willie Mays and hitting”.
Erik Kratz. Lol.
(Next up on the all time s**t parade is MARK LEMONGELLO telling us all how the “strike zone was instantly made-smaller, every time he took the mound, and he demands an investigation…as “The Russians did it”)
@dodgerskingsfan, So if the Red Sox cheated in 2018, why was Betts, Price, and Kelly from that team welcomed with open arms to the Dodgers? Just curious.
If 2 teams are cheating I’ll put my money on the better team winning like the Red Sox in 2018.
Why don’t they get rid of signs all together.
Put speakers in the pitchers hat and catcher helmet.
Let the dugout give the pitch through a radio
scanner, anyone?
How does the NFL prevent their signals from being intercepted? Same thing, isn’t it?
Communications caan be encrypted.
It’s done in many places
Yeah. And do you TRULY care?
Encrypted or not…these players suck.
Period
Baseball has always been a game of thievery. Bases, signs, but most importantly, our hearts : )
So he’s accusing either the Giants, Dodgers or Royals.
samthebravesfan:
From the article, “…a team that has been to the World Series often recently…”
The Giants haven’t been to the WS since 2014, and the Royals not since 2015. Not sure that qualifies as “recently”.
What if a completely 3rd party did this? Like the mafia?
Mafia guy #1 is in the centerfield bleachers with binoculars. He steals the signs and relays it to mafia guy #2 who is sitting behind home plate.
Mafia guy #2: Every time he gets a buzz, he yells “We want a pitcher, not a belly itcher!”
I wonder how long it would take the team to figure out what is going on. Is this illegal?
Just a hunch, Kratz probably wouldn’t mind the opportunity to coach or manage in professional baseball, as he didn’t make a ton of money as a player.
I doubt that he’d make serious claims if there wasn’t some truth to it, as this will effect the number of potential opportunities to find work within baseball.
He made MORE than enough.
For a .200 hitting, backup catcher? He wasn’t “worth 18 cents”.
But still…they paid him.
He got nothing to worry about.
Go and play golf “THE Erik Kratz”. Maybe you can “break 200 at that game”.
Cause you struggled mightily to do that…at this one.
Jeff Mathis is a VERY sad man now. (He has no one left to rival him for “worst player left in the league” now that “Bad hip” Davis is out, Kratz is retired etc.
(Then again? There is still Plunko. Gregory Polanco. So long as that Running Camel and Whiffing Albatross is still making money…then there is still hope for Jeff Mathis!)
Haha- sounds kinda lame to me. Sounds more like suspicion, well-poisoning, than anything. Kratz is irrelevant.
THE Erik Kratz, sage thou he is…
“My favorite part of no hitters is the pitcher looking for the catcher after he gets the last out. Rodon is the only one who never looked for his catcher”
THE Baseball World’s reply (as we know better).
“My favorite part of no hitters, is knowing that it would become as useless a stat as the “save” or “quality start” is now…IF Erik Kratz (oh, I am sorry…THE Erik Kratz) times 9…were in the lineup. Heck…even Chris Archer could throw a no hitter if the world had more of THE Erik Kratz in its lineups. Kratz is the only one who never looked for his video of how he hit (or better stated…”didn’t”). Even Rodon has a better chance of hitting a baseball”.
“If you think no one else was doing it, you are wrong. The difference is, the Astros may have taken it a little too far.”
‘If you think no one else was killing and eating people, you are wrong. The difference is Jeffrey Dahmer shouldn’t have kept the leftovers in his freezer.’
Or MLB could enforce the rules (and stop doctoring the balls) so their sport doesn’t become WWE. Or is it too late already?
For that playa you get to go one on one with the Undertaker.
Holla holla holla.
Really could care less who cheats. The World is full of cheaters at all levels. Manfred has ruined this game so let me cheat. Small minority care about baseball anymore.
Kratz should get to the point and name the team. We can parse his words and what he might have been barely trying to hide. Stop pussyfooting around and say what you mean, Mr. Kratz. Otherwise he’s just stirring things up and dragging other teams down with the one he’s too scared to name for some silly reason. If you’re gonna throw the bomb, own it and name the team you’re calling out.
Wonder if Toronto is one of the teams
They are the definition of cheaters
Glasnow claims they cheated
I like to imagine that the reason that the Astros got a slap on the wrist is because things would’ve gotten way to out of hand with all the allegations that would’ve followed. Going along with Manfred’s plan worked out in a way that allowed minimal punishment.
If it turned out the Dodgers were cheating, would they defend their team, or would they abandon like they so expect Astros fans to do.
If it turned out the moon was made of green cheese, would you bring the wine and crackers?
Nice response…..
Typical Dodgers fan smh
He has now made all MLB organizations become his enemy. No chance to survive, good-bye commentator job good-bye TV appearances good-bye baseball.
Kratz said a recent WS team maybe the Nationals cheated and not the Dodgers.
he said a team that’s been to the WS recently and often. It has to be the Dodgers. McCann hinted at it after game 7. Even Lance did too.
Astros just had a guy snitch and tell you how they did it. Redsox players were able to get their story together since the Union protects their players. Astros players really didn’t have to talk because they are protected. It’s funny people complain about players not gettng suspended when Manfred said himself they wouldn’t be able to punish them. The trash can banging wasn’t illegal. Using real time footage was. Other teams more than likely did the same just in different methods.
There were allegations that the Dodgers were stealing signs in 2018. Still waiting for the smoking gun. Oh that’s right. It’s been years and nothing.
This is what that idiot Kratz is talking about. You think this is anywhere close to what the Astros did? Sounds a lot like sour grapes. Read it. Sounds a lot more like paranoia than facts or evidence. Stupidity.
theathletic.com/599226/2018/10/18/something-looks-…
By the way all catchers and pitchers are paranoid about sign stealing. It’s the ultimate excuse for pitchers. Kenley Jansen one time intentionally balked with a runner at second so that no base runner had access to his signs. You didn’t hear Jansen btch and moan about sign stealing. When you lose all the excuses come out. Cue the Brewers. If the Dodgers were blatantly cheating you don’t think we would have heard it by now? All it takes is one disgruntled former player, or one player with loose lips.
mlb.com/amp/news/kenley-jansen-executes-intentiona…
As a crew fan I never heard them Bitch. If they took it up with MLB great. Obviously nothing came from it. Or MLB doesn’t give a load about a small market team. Not sure why your butt Hurt over this.
Not butt hurt. Not understanding why we’re giving Kratz the time and day. He was an irrelevant player and obviously still sour about losing. So it must have been the Dodgers cheating!
Speculation & sour grapes by a loser!
Sign stealing is part of baseball – BUT telegraphing the pitch to the batter by “external or verbal means” DURING windup or release is not. Needs Proof & a Commish willing to do something ! Not Manfred
Tempest in a teapot. Like PED’s, either everyone thinks they know everything about every team or they just throw their hands up in the air and say that everyone does it.
Do you think the Astros players care about yankee fans behavior when they come to the stadium? Maybe, because no fan base has hurled more trash onto the ball field than those scumbags. That’s ok?
If your signs are being stolen, shame on you. Assume every team is going to try and that they will utilize every tool possible. Then outsmart them. We defeated the Japanese and German armies by outsmarting them. Has America gotten that stupid?
Its a great day when we don’t have any posts from your little tiny corner of a mind!
New York Yankees fans threw baseballs on the field during the eighth inning of the team’s 8-2 loss to the Tampa Bay Rays on Friday night.
Fans were throwing baseballs onto the field from the Yankee Stadium bleachers to the point where the officials had to stop the game with the Yankees at bat in the bottom of the eighth. The public announcer had to ask fans to refrain from throwing baseballs or any other objects on the field.
Who cares what the nobody Kratz has to say about anything. He’s a loser.
Dodgers fan I’m guessing?
Does anyone think it funny that someone in the Brewer organization is claiming that they lost to opponents because of sign stealing? How is it that Christian Yelich moves to the Brewers from the Marlins and his HR totals double from 18 to 36, in an era when pitching is so dominant.
Pitching is dominant this year. Previous two years the baseball was juiced. Maybe we’re not watching the same thing… you can defiantly see a difference year to year. Tough to compete against a team that can afford any player they want. If I was crew And I thought something suspicious was happening I would do the same thing. You wouldn’t?
If you ain’t cheating, you ain’t trying. All teams cheat, let’s be honest.
Just look at the Patriots. Belicheat got them 6 rings.
Kratz tried to trash talk Joey Votto in 2019 from behind the plate, Kratz is a big dude. But Votto turned around and went nose to nose. Kratz backed down, didn’t do sh&t. Cheap talk gets no respect.
Damn, obvious league wide issue is a league wide issue. This is my shocked face. Go cry about the Astros more and stick your head in the sand to anybody who doesn’t think their team cheated.
Kratz was barely relevant as a player; now as a citizen? Who cares about his “insights”…
LA teams always get the benefit of the doubt, just look at LeBron and the Lakers. The Dodgers no doubt get the same beneficial treatment.
A team like the Astros gets all the blame when the Red Sox barely even get a slap on the wrist. Nice double-standard in pro sports.
Thank God for the mute button…
So Mike Fiers is a hero. Erik Kratz is a bum. Thanks for the insight, comments section.
Astros fans are going to love this story
Only if it turns out he’s telling the truth.
Truth? About what? That players steal signs? Since the dawn of the game?
We teach little leagues to “read the signs”.
(HE’S GONNA BUNT…yells the 3rd baseman)
(CURVEBALL COMING…yells the 3rd base coach on some Kiski Prep JV Team.)
Players have been “stealing signs” since Abner Doubleday.
(If baseball TRULY cared? They don’t…you can bank on that)…then…here is how you “fix it”.
GET BETTER BASEBALL PLAYERS.
You think Sandy Koufax cared…at all, if someone “stole his sign?” Nope. They (GOOD hitters) back then…couldnt hit a Koufax 12-6 curve…even if it were telegraphed on the scoreboard and the ball was the size of a beachball.
Today’s hitters? Against Koufax?
Would ALL be Erik Kratz against any modicum of “real pitching”.
A scrub like Kratz? Wouldn’t even bat .050 against pitchers like that.
But “Baseball” continues to make excuses and nonstories to try to cover up and explain away the “why” the game sucks and it is ALL…B.S.
For here is the reason “why”.
The players suck.
Period.
Get better players? Game changes. No amount of “sign stealing” would matter anyway…cause Bob Gibson would plant one…in your neck…if ya did.
Then he would strike em out. Plain and simple.
But keep sissipating the game? (It gets more and more like a pansy arse version of Tiddlywinks…with each passing day…and yep.
You will continue to pay for watered down garbage in uniforms.
Speaking of which…players don’t even “get dirty” anymore. Uniforms as clean after the game as it was “pre-game”.
Why? They don’t care.
And they haven’t cared since 1994.
Game is a shell now.
In other words “blah blah blah”.
In other words (in the words of you “fans of sissipation” baseball).
Blah blah blah.
You don’t care? Then don’t.
But when you do? Well…that “blah blah blah” shall be too late.
The game is dying. If not already-dead, due to too many “blah blah blahs” and not enough “Fix it…right nows”.
Wake me up please…when more than Milennial “blah blah blah” is a rebuttal.
(See yinz in 2060)
You type all of that and still say nothing.
And you type a reply and give me a web link.
Have a thought or opinion for your own
1st rule. Don’t bore me.
(Websites bore me.).
Speak woman speak! Let’s hear what YOU think. Not someone else’s thoughts, copied and pasted.
I didn’t give you a weblink. In fact, before I said “blah blah blah”, I didn’t talk to you at all on this article. I have no idea why you’re acting as if I’ve talked to you before or why you think I care about whatever rules you’ve created for yourself.
Then utilize thy ‘at symbol’ next time.
This thing. “@” and subsequently type name of to whom you are addressing.
Makes it so much more agreeable for the respondent.
That’s “Rule #2” (“Learn thy grammar” and “use it”).
But you DID pass Rule 1. (You didn’t bore me).
Well done. You’re batting .500 now.
That is 292 points higher than THE Erik Kratz ever could.
Kudos good sir
Somewhere (likely nowhere near a batting cage…The “Batting Cage Union Alliance of Crusaders” has banned Erik Kratz from entrance into one. They said…it “is too embarrassing to Gregory Polanco or Sean Rodriguez types to have Erik Kratz in one, as that “non-hitting KO-vid” thing permeates it…and creates lower batting averages for all involved”.
But I digress on that.
THE Erik Kratz…played 90 games for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Batted a “super stellar” .111, and has NEVER had more “eyes” upon what he ever did (didn’t/couldn’t) do as a “ballplayer” than he ever does now as a “quasi-whistleblower”.
I doth quoteth thy Sally Field. “You Like Me…You REALLY Like Me” as Kratz accepts his “most eyeballs on a total NON-story award”…received for this thread alone.
The Pirates couldn’t draw flies to doggie poopie. So Kratz is now saying to himself…”after all those years being among the leagues worst players…not being able to hit a round spherical object since 3rd grade…I am NOW Remembered…forever…and all across the Fruited Plain and on all the ships at sea”.
Yay me.
Erik Kratz. (Oh, I am sorry…I meant “THE Erik Kratz”) THE legend…in his own mind.
(Couldn’t hit the broad side of the Empire State Building with the Titanic…but he sure knows all about “sign stealing”.
(Too bad HE himself could not steal one or two…across a couple more of those 9 years, where he didn’t even “hit” higher than.198 (and .198 is a banner year for him. “Close eyes…swing” some times…works). Then perhaps, them 6-11 non-arms with 5.25 ERAs wouldn’t have looked so much like Warren Spahn while tossing 88 mph Fastballs by his bat all those years.
When THE Erik Kratz…can tell the world how we too can make 4 MILLION dollars across 11 garbage years…and fail 80 percent of the time at our jobs, and still keep em?
Then I will care what THE Erik Kratz has to say.
Til then? He is a non-entity.
Simply another in an empirically-long conga line of never wases and holdovers who seem to “know so very much about everything”…except that which they are making aforementioned 4 MILLION to do.
Players like that? Would not make a roster prior to 1986. Well…on any team that wasn’t (of course) The Pittsburgh Pirates.
They love garbage hitters. (See: The ToadScrubber and Joggin Georgie Hendrick and Chad Hermansen and Saint Sean de Rodrigue and Disaster LeMaster. The Pirates…will pay ANYONE to come play there.
Maybe..they can locate Sam Rice’s remains…clone him…and stick him out there to get 13 more hits someday? I dunno. But hey…Pittsburgh does have world class medical research facilities, hospitals and labs. Anything’s possible.
Proven by the fact that THIS big mouth/no talent hack was paid by them and several others for so long.
THE Erik Kratz. Our new ‘Criswell’
I sleep easier now, knowing that any moron who “understands or defends” this buffoon…NEVER PLAYED THIS GAME.
Catchers could use Egyptian Hieroglyphics…have JJ “DynoMite” Walker out there with airline directional flags…and employ Marconi to dit dit dit…dash dash dash the signs into Cape Race and it won’t matter one hill of beans.
Players are gonna steal signs until the end of time IF they can.
I did as a player. You did too (if you were a player).
That is why they are called “signs”. You always were taught to “read for the Indicator”. Always taught to “hit ball where pitched” from Little League thru College to Minors to Semi Pro and even the good ol beer leagues now.
It is HOW THE GAME IS PLAYED.
And if pitchers didn’t suck more than Mrs. Jack Rabbit on a date, these days? They wouldn’t need them.
Because “today’s hitters”? Couldn’t “hit” their way out of a wet paper bag.
Sad thing is? Not only do the hitters…supposedly-PROFESSIONAL HITTERS (lol)…stink on ice.
But the pitchers are even worse.
A monkey could hit today’s pitchers.
They don’t pitch. They simply “throw’ and “flail” and ultimately fail.
The game sucks.
And I do not care what THE Erik Kratz says.
He was barely even a player. A nondescript hack who couldn’t “play” on our 50 and up league these days.
Why? He cannot hit. At all.
And simply “squatting down…catching a pitched baseball and 26 percent of the time MAYBE throwing out a runner. Mind you, this isn’t “Omar Moreno nor Billy North nor Tim Raines nor Rickey Henderson” he is “throwing out”.
(More like Miguel Cabrera). Who couldn’t “outrun a house fire”.
Thusly…Erik Kratz? Just shut up.
No one (especially me) cares what you think…nor what you think you know.
Because you hit like Helen Keller.
Come back and tell us all something we don’t already know when you found a real job?
Oh…you need one?
Good. Come work for me. Your hired.
But with one caveat. If you SUCK 80 Percent of the time, as you did across 11 seasons in baseball?
I will fire your ass in 11 minutes.
And you will keep your mouth shut.
Why? Because business is business and baseball should be baseball.
The way you played it? Makes any AA guy I know proud to know that he is 1) better at any facet than your scrub ass is. And 2) know that “all they gotta do to MAKE it to whatever the hell “today’s Bigs” is? Is become a political sellout punk. OR..”just take nice long showers w your managers and understand early on, that you can’t “make it” as a baseball player (because you suck)…so you gotta suck up TO, or off…those who “couldn’t do…so end up teaching”.
Lol.
Ya know? There WAS a time when Rogers Hornsby, Frank Robinson, Dusty Baker, Gil Hodges, etc managed baseball teams.
You either know baseball or you don’t.
And now you get these garbage pail “managers” whom never could hit a baseball, nor throw it at anything above A level baseball…”managing” players who have been playing a child’s game since age 7…and that is exactly how “baseball wants its Derek Sheltons or Buddy Biancalana or Jeff Banister types”.
Pointless, powerless and stupid.
These managers don’t “manage” anymore. They can’t.
The owners and GMS are full-slave now to their own creation.
And the very reason why Big Mouth Kratz here decides to “speak up now?” (The jerk has only had 2+ years to do so..IF he had anything) is because he “wants to manage” now.
Can’t PLAY the game…may as well go and be a MANAGER too. Cause them baseball “minds” (lack thereof) would hire a DOG to manage a baseball team…so long as he a “good little boy, coddles these overpaid jackwagons and preaches the “well, it’s a team effort” party line.
Dudes and Dude-ettes? Your game sucks.
Rest assured…THIS hack will manage a “baseball team” someday.
And yet he probably made more money in 11 years (as you say sucking) then you will make in your life time but then you do act like your 10 years old.
No. He just sucked for 11 years.
At least you got that part correct.
By the way, “Redwood”.
I am sure Tara Reid and Brett Sommers and Ish Kabibble “made more money than I ever will too”.
Doesn’t mean they are any good.
All…politics is what it is.
Learn…the…game.
Or? You can keep your head buried in the sand and keep idol-worshipping (and defending) “prison ration/level slop” (about 90% of “baseball player” caliber-equivalent in todays “sorta/kinda game”.
Or…you can defend EXCELLENCE.
And the ONLY “similarities of Erik Kratz and Excellence”? Is the letter E.
Guy was a nondescript scrub.
Period.
Next case
In other words (in the words of you “fans of sissipation” baseball).
Blah blah blah.
You don’t care? Then don’t.
But when you do? Well…that “blah blah blah” shall be too late.
The game is dying. If not already-dead, due to too many “blah blah blahs” and not enough “Fix it…right nows”.
Wake me please…when “today’s fan” says more than blah in a rebuttal.
(See yinz in 2060.)
Little punk!
@manny
Who?
It’s time for both teams to relocate. The Rockies can move to Utah and the Dodgers can pack their bags for South America.
Today’s “fans” constantly amuse me.
Please tell me you didn’t have Kratz on your “fantasy baseball team”.
What did he cost? A penny and maybe Chris Archer in trade, to get?
Raise your standards “fans”.
The game has too many of this ilk around, calling themselves “baseball players”.
They aren’t.
Pete Rose belongs in the Hall of Fame.
Period
So…”the steal of the sign or not” is a debate that will go on until the end of baseball’s time. (As every team has and does this, at every level since the beginning of time for the game).
But…Bullwinkle “How about something we all can enjoy”? (A preface however…this post will be “more than 2 sentences long…so if that offends or upsets you?….oh well. You’ll get over it)
BUT…Can someone please tell me how in Hell, ANGEL HERNANDEZ still has a job, as a Major League Umpire?
Now…my points here, with context are as follows:
1) I “get” that every Ump will blow a call now and then. (It is as commonplace as “teams stealing signs”. And Umpires do not always have an easy job. BUT…it is one thing, if you “miss a bang bang play at the bag” (tie should always go to The Runner)…or ya make a bad “strike call” behind the plate. (Usually…any TRUE umpire will know “they blew that call” and make it up on the next call. (That’s fair, that’s good umping…thats baseball. As they DON’T want to be the “determining factors of a game’s outcome”.) And for the most part…umps ain’t bad. (Now see #2).
2) But in Angel Hernandez’s case? He seems to be relishing the fact that his pathetic non-performance as an umpire HAS dictated outcomes of games. A lot of them. Blatantly and flagrantly. To the point where he walks around w his smirk on his face as if to PROVOKE a player.
And of course…’ya can’t argue balls and strikes…instant replay can only be used on certain plays (frankly? They should BAN instant replay entirely. It slows the game…and rarely seems to matter anyway (on those ‘challenged plays’) the overall outcome anyway.
BUT…when umps flagrantly blow a call (and Angel Hernandez seems to do it…on purpose), how come THAT cannot be reversed? (Thusly? Instant Replay is dumb. Either challenge all…or challenge none.)
Because not only does Angel dictate game outcomes, by simply being pathetic at his job…as well as a smug jagoff, but THEN he will eject players for simply…”staring at him?”
And ya ‘cant reverse an ejection’ either. (Again…toss 3 players in one inning? (And there wasn’t even a bench clearing brawl?) That is “dictating outcomes of games”. Now see #3
3) up and down the line here, you all know I am VERY critical of the “game” as it exists today. The game is watered down, the overall caliber of players is WAY down. Several ridiculously stupid “new rules” have been implemented.
Yet they have NOT done one thing to hold malfeasance accountable.
And Angel Hernandez is the EPITOME of it.
For years…we were forced to deal with that equally-smug jerk Joe West, doing the exact same thing. And now? Even with all the simplified rules? These Umps have it EASY. Sure, they still gonna “miss one” now and then. But 30% of the time?
When I talk “old school versus new school” of baseball…that includes Umpires. (For that is “part of the game”). The caliber of umpire has fallen as dramatically-fast as the caliber of player.
And there was a time when a Billy Martin, Earl Weaver, Lou Piniella type would NOT sit still for that, and rightfully so. Arguing with the umps is a MUST be part of the game. It should be reimplemented. Tossed only..if you go too far.
But this “sign stealing crapola” is not the end all/be all of baseball’s problems.
Bad umpiring costs this game more time, affects outcomes, etc…and has cheapened the game so much that (if there ever does come again…an “ace arm who can paint corners”…he will have to throw the ball right down the middle of the plate, where even a hack (like Angel Hernandez or a Joe West type) can “get it right…maybe half the time?”
Baseball needs a cleansing. Badly.
Subpar standards of expectation have permeated every facet of the game.
The fans who remember when quality baseball was a common event…are being replaced by fans who only understand “he hit home run…7 Inning Doubleheaders…and Runner on 2nd to start an extra inning”.
What’s next? They “hit a home run and won’t be required to circle the bases?”
Angel Hernandez…and his mysterious ability to remain employed, even with the watered down condition of the game today? Is a travesty.
And it is reflective of the “baseball powers truly don’t care attitude” of the game.
It is no wonder this sign stealing thing is a “thing”. No wonder why fans are leaving in droves. No wonder why the game is becoming robotic.
For they “keep changing crap” to make it “appear as if they are doing something”. Yet for every rule they change, sissipate or water down? They fail to address the fact that the standards of the game have sunk lower than the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Angel should have been fired a decade ago. 200 hitting uber-millionaires should be released, at will. And expectations of excellence should be protected. Not “changed” to make the game easier.
Until those occur? It will get worse. Much worse.