Sign stealing's Zapruder tape
A minor, and for some much needed, distraction from the business end of the baseball season came this week in the form of a video uploaded to YouTube. The video, from the second part of Detroit's double-header against Minnesota on Tuesday, claims to show Twins catcher and MVP candidate Joe Mauer on 2nd base tipping pitches to teammate Jason Kubel.
From watching the video it's pretty clear that Mauer is doing something, whether that is pitch tipping or not I guess is up to your own interpretation. Strangely. the consensus across the articles and blog posts I've read this week seems to be that Mauer probably is guilty but everyone does it and it's not really cheating. I'm fine with that, I've never played baseball and I'm not exactly a seaonsed veteren when it comes to watching it. Sign stealing being common place, though, did surprise me somewhat.
At the end of the day I guess you'd be hard pushed to find an example of someone stealing signs and changing the outcome of the game. Perhaps the fact that this story even made the news is only due to the stigma around the words 'sign stealing' that have made bigger stories in other sports.
What I did find amusing was this story about the Twins reactions to the allegations and, in particular, this Ron Gardenhire quote:
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From watching the video it's pretty clear that Mauer is doing something, whether that is pitch tipping or not I guess is up to your own interpretation. Strangely. the consensus across the articles and blog posts I've read this week seems to be that Mauer probably is guilty but everyone does it and it's not really cheating. I'm fine with that, I've never played baseball and I'm not exactly a seaonsed veteren when it comes to watching it. Sign stealing being common place, though, did surprise me somewhat.
At the end of the day I guess you'd be hard pushed to find an example of someone stealing signs and changing the outcome of the game. Perhaps the fact that this story even made the news is only due to the stigma around the words 'sign stealing' that have made bigger stories in other sports.
What I did find amusing was this story about the Twins reactions to the allegations and, in particular, this Ron Gardenhire quote:
Chrysler!? Thats...what? An exclaimation? Unsubtle product placement? A colloquialism I'm not familiar with? If anyone could fill me in I'd be grateful
"That's why we're three games back," he said. "We scored two runs last night. We're stealing a lot of signs."
Gardenhire shook his head.
"Chrysler! " he said. "You're giving people too much credit here boys."
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