Reese Kaplan -- The Long History of Cheating in Baseball

With all of the angst regarding the roster rollercoaster of the past week or so, perhaps it's time to move onto a new topic du jour.  

Many of you may not know the name Mark Armour.  He is with SABR -- the Society for American Baseball Research.  As a dedicated researcher, he was elected President of the Board of Directors in 2019 after founding and running the Baseball Biography Project.  He's been seriously involved in the history of the game, including an award winning book he wrote entitled Joe Cronin: A Life in Baseball back in 2014.  

He co-authored In Pursuit of Pennants in 2015 and the following year brought back from the dead the SABR Baseball Cards Committee.  In other words, he's eminently qualified to speak eloquently about the topic of baseball and how it has created news during its long history.  

Earlier this year Armour put together a video that was short but fun viewing entitled "Baseball Cheating Scandals That Changed the Rules" for GQ Sports.  In it he detailed some of the various baseball cheating incidents over the years and the impact they had on how the game was going to be played in the future.   

One of the first topics he covered was how pitchers altered their advantage on the mound by licking their fingers or applying saliva onto their hands to give the baseballs they threw a different feel and way to alter the natural motion by the application of a foreign substance.  We've all seen pitchers who tried to give themselves a winning edge by doing something to the baseball.  It started back in the 1800s and hasn't changed much until today.

Another method of cheating was stealing signs.  This practice also has a long history in the game that involved binoculars, rifle scopes and other ways to zoom in on the catcher to try to ascertain whether the next pitch was going to be straight or contain movement of some kind such as is experienced with the curveball or slider.  Recently the Astros used a trashcan and a bag to add an auditory way of cheating into the game's history.

Not too long ago we experienced the heyday of steroids and other PEDs that players gave themselves to help increase muscle mass, preserve declining youth and to speed up the healing process from injuries.  

No one can forget the otherworldly physiques of players pre-syringes like Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Jose Canseco and others who used any means necessary to increase the frequency and magnitude of home runs they hit.  Earlier in the game's history it was the use of amphetamines to help clear heads after nights of excessive drinking or to help accelerate the use of muscles to bring the players' games more back to their recollection of what they used to be able to do naturally without pills for assistance.

A whole separate issue for pitchers was the spitball and how it could offer up a greater challenge to the hitters when the motion it made was not a natural movement of a dry,  mud-rubbed baseball.   Everyone remembers the great Gaylord Perry whose talent was formidable alone but raised to a Cooperstown level when he mastered the implementation of a spitball to his pitching arsenal.  

The theory was that adding a foreign substance to the ball could help curtail its ability to spin and consequently increase the severity in which it would drop when thrown to the plate.  Several rule changes were made back in the early part of the 20th century up to and during Perry's career, but it didn't seem to have much impact on controlling what he did.  

Hitters are no different than pitchers when it comes to seeking out a better way of getting wood on the ball.  Players have been checked for the insertion of cork, Superballs and other foreign objects into hollowed out ends of their bats to try to make them lighter, more bounce capable when connecting with the ball or otherwise giving them an advantage over natural wood alone.  

No Mets fan can forget the whole issue Whitey Herzog of the Cardinals had with the bats used by third baseman Howard Johnson who he accused of tampering with his bats to aid in his home run power artificially.

Across town it was then Yankee manager Billy Martin who went ballistic when he took exception to a long ball smacked over the fence by Kanasas City Royals' George Brett since the amount of pinte tar on his bat seemed to exceed the limited length up the bat from the handle.  The umpires temporarily rulled it no home run but then reversed themselves and it bevamse one of the most famous tainted home runs in baseball history.

Of course, there are other ways cheating has and will continue to affect the outcome of games on the field.  Players will get more creative and more high tech in what they do.  The league will always be several steps behind and whatever actions are taken to combat the problems will likely only spur on the creativeity of the players to begin anew. If you have a few minutes, watch Armour's video.  It's fun and informative both.