Max Scherzer has been accused by an Angels employee of having purchased a sticky goo substance used to illegally grip the baseball. Also accused are Cole, Justin Verlander, Felix Hernandez, Corey Kluber, Adam Wainwright, and basically everyone who has ever pitched for the Angels. I'm not one who ever cared about the Astros stealing signs so I don't see this as an issue either, particularly since it is apparently fairly widespread. My only concern would be whether Scherzer's production drops next year now that the cheating has been exposed.

But for the fans around the league who condemned the Astros I wonder if they will have the same reaction about their star pitchers being outed as having bent the rules.

https://www.latimes.com/sports/ange...ba-harkins-names-players-illegal-product

Would be refreshing to see some actual tangible evidence that Scherzer (and the rest) used a foreign substance before the media hysterically whips up a typical witch trial/rush to judgement.

The guy making the accusation put the claim in as part of his lawsuit against the Angels, I'm no lawyer but if he's lying I believe he'd be opening himself up to both criminal charges and civil penalties. No denials from Scherzer and there are reports that using gunk to enhance grip for ball rotation is common throughout MLB. So I'd say that it's credible.

I'm with Richard Petty, if you ain't cheating you ain't trying, so I like the idea of our guys getting an advantage, I just wonder if MLB will apply the same standards they have been using for steroids and sign stealing.

Foreign substances for pitchers are indeed commonplace, as are PED's for hitters -- but that didnt make Zimmerman guilty of being linked to that scandal from a few years ago, so innocent til proven guilty for Max. If I was Max's agent I wouldn't have him comment either, and that has nothing to do with whether Max is guilty of this or not. The bitter ex-employee who's PO'd that he got fired better bring something else to the table other than hearsay. If he has evidence, fine, let him bring it on.

Cherzer guy ees good peetcher, no awart ees tainted.

Heem's Hawly Femmer.

Was looking at my profile pic from 2010. Those car wash girls would probably be out there in thongs now, or at least 1/2 butt coverage bottoms, but their asses still look great.

Back then there was a guy from California who posted here. He started the legendary "Anti-Misogyny" thread that had the most ever page views on this board. He had porn actress Stacey Donovan in his profile pic, which was a closeup on her face. She was in ecstasy, takin it in Door 2 or Door 3 who knows. That was the golden era of this place. Mang, dose werr da dezz.

The Ryan Zimmerman steroid accusation popped back in the news this week. The lawsuit he filed is still going after five years and apparently will be on-going for years to come. Zimmerman wants the evidence in the case to be sealed while Al Jazeera wants to embarrass him into dropping the suit. The latest claim is that the network wants to make public copies of emails between Zimmerman and the steroid dealer who claimed Ryan as a customer while on hidden camera.

https://www.sportico.com/law/analysis/2021/ryan-zimmerman-peds-al-jazeera-1234621570/

MLB is rolling out strict enforcement of ball doctoring rules next week with inspections and ten day suspensions for violations. A lot of pitchers are having to reinvent each of their pitches to adjust to life without tar. Our resident ace had a very public and very sudden and strange injury causing him to miss a few games. I wonder if he is using this time to figure out what he can and can't throw.

When they suddenly stop using anything, as Glasnow implied, they try to make up for it by gripping the ball harder, and that leads to more arm injuries.

I do think it's unfair to begin the tough enforcement 40 percent of the way into a season, cold turkey.

In 150 years of stats on Baseball Reference 2021 has the second fewest hits per game in MLB history, trailing only 1908. So far this season also has the most strikeouts per season. The pitchers can cry about the enforcement stepping up mid-season but they are the ones who broke the rule to the point of drastically changing the game. In 2005 there was an average of 1.437 hits per strikeout, just sixteen years later that has dropped to .883. No sympathy for the pitchers, a pitchers duel like tonight is fine as the exception but there has been too much slow and scoreless baseball as MLB is also on pace to set a record for longest average game length.

Nine hits and 16 strikeouts last night. Great walk off win but hop more offense today.

More strikeouts than hits, for (I think) the sixth year in a row.

That is correct, not too long ago there were 1.400 hits per strikout, so far this year it is 0.883, a completely different game. I'm with Manfred on this, bring back the hits.

Year H K H/K
2021 7.89 8.94 0.883
2020 8.04 8.68 0.926
2019 8.65 8.81 0.982
2018 8.44 8.48 0.995
2017 8.69 8.25 1.053
2016 8.71 8.03 1.085
2015 8.67 7.71 1.125
2014 8.56 7.7 1.112
2013 8.66 7.55 1.147
2012 8.65 7.5 1.153
2011 8.7 7.1 1.225
2010 8.76 7.06 1.241
2009 8.96 6.91 1.297
2008 9.06 6.77 1.338
2007 9.25 6.62 1.397
2006 9.28 6.52 1.423
2005 9.05 6.3 1.437
2004 9.17 6.55 1.400

The way it's being implemented is a bad look.

A few days ago MLB announced another crack down on foreign substance use by pitchers and suddenly Scherzer has another mysterious pulled muscle.

My new theory is that Scherzer is ducking the Nats this week with a fake hamstring injury because he doesn't want to get caught with pine tar the way that Davey Johnson ratted out Joel Peralta.