Houston Asterisks

socaljim242 said:

You had me till you gave the Astro fan ....but others have cheated excuse.
"the Dodgers busted cheating with laser pointers or some sort"

Thats such fuckin bullshit. Yes the Dodgers got busted using a laser pointer TO MOVE OUTFEILDERS TO WERE THEY WANTED HIM TO PLAY DEFENSIVELY. Thats not even in the same universe of what they astros were doing.

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Hook'Em0608 said:

I bet secretly the MLB is more angry at Mike Fiers than the Houston Astros.

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Hook'Em0608 said:

My point wasn't to make an equal comparison, clearly they aren't, it was to point out how teams attempt to use technology to gain a competitive advantage and occasionally it gets called out. Anyway, I'm not trying to start a tit for tat comparison.

My point was this.

Corked bats, substances on pitches, stealing signs, steroids, technology, etc etc etc

MLB has a history of this and I don't think they really want to change. The Astros just put them in a position where they had to do something because the roof was about to get blown off by social media. I bet secretly the MLB is more angry at Mike Fiers than the Houston Astros.

All these players are coming out pretending to be surprised and outraged when it was clear in 2017 by all the mound visits in the playoffs they knew what was going on. At the time, as a clueless fan, I thought they were worried about Astros baserunners stealing signs but if you go back and watch some of these occurred with nobody on base. They knew then. Didn't say anything publicly.

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Hook'Em0608 said:

Okay to clarify my point some and make it specific to this Astros issue, so teams have been trying to steal signs since the invention of baseball. Everybody agrees with this. If you figure out the other teams signs, it’s okay to tell the batter what is coming if you have a runner on second base, but no other time. It’s okay to use a camera feed to try to help figure these out, but you can only study this information before or after the game. All of these things are technically against the rules of course, but everyone accepts that they are allowed as long as you do them exactly like I’ve stated.

Oh, and if the pitcher does something slightly different for each type of pitch that helps the batter know what is coming, then it is generally regarded as the pitchers fault because DUH everyone knows that the batter is desperately looking for any indication to help him know what is coming.

Before anyone tries to claim I’m absolving the Astros of wrongdoing, that ain’t it. They cheated and should be punished. I just find the player outrage silly when the sport is completely shaped by unwritten rules, most of which are technically “cheating”. When a team is cheating, nobody seems to say anything until after the fact. So in reality, they don't really care if it's benefitting them at the time. So they have no moral high ground to stand on.

The only folks I sympathize with is the fans. I truly do feel bad for fans who had high quality teams capable of winning it all and we will never truly know who the best team was.

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Hook'Em0608 said:

Okay to clarify my point some and make it specific to this Astros issue, so teams have been trying to steal signs since the invention of baseball. Everybody agrees with this. If you figure out the other teams signs, it’s okay to tell the batter what is coming if you have a runner on second base, but no other time. It’s okay to use a camera feed to try to help figure these out, but you can only study this information before or after the game. All of these things are technically against the rules of course, but everyone accepts that they are allowed as long as you do them exactly like I’ve stated.

Oh, and if the pitcher does something slightly different for each type of pitch that helps the batter know what is coming, then it is generally regarded as the pitchers fault because DUH everyone knows that the batter is desperately looking for any indication to help him know what is coming.

Before anyone tries to claim I’m absolving the Astros of wrongdoing, that ain’t it. They cheated and should be punished. I just find the player outrage silly when the sport is completely shaped by unwritten rules, most of which are technically “cheating”. When a team is cheating, nobody seems to say anything until after the fact. So in reality, they don't really care if it's benefitting them at the time. So they have no moral high ground to stand on.

The only folks I sympathize with is the fans. I truly do feel bad for fans who had high quality teams capable of winning it all and we will never truly know who the best team was.

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Bloody Brian Burke said:

Known cheater backs cheaters.

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Bloody Brian Burke said:

Known cheater backs cheaters.

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Battlelyon said:

Ortiz is a joke

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socaljim242 said:

Whats hilarious is people like you will point out all the ways players will try to steal the signs off the catcher, point out that from the beginning of baseball knowing what pitch was coming was the holy grail of getting an advantage over the pitcher. And then come back with, but we don't know if was really an advantage or how much of one it was. LOL.

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Hook'Em0608 said:

Not that I'm surprised since you have a vivid imagination on all the forums you post on, but I never said this. I've said we will never know who the best team was because the Astros cheated. I've got no delusions at all about what occurred in 2017. My team cheated.

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socaljim242 said:

This is you basically saying the astros were just doing what everyone else was doing or would do and the astro players are no different than any other team.
"So if anything, this tells me about the lack of moral compass in professional baseball players. That Astros team wasn't full of morally bankrupt individuals outside the norm of baseball. It was full of modern day baseball players all looking for an edge and not giving a shit about the purity of the game or who might be hurt.

2015 Yankees busted cheating. 2017 Yankees and Red Sox busted cheating. Dodgers busted cheating with laser pointers of some sort. 2018 Red Sox busted cheating. etc etc etc"

That's not my "vivid imagination"
That's you trying to minimize what the Astro team did.

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socaljim242 said:

This is you basically saying the astros were just doing what everyone else was doing or would do and the astro players are no different than any other team.
"So if anything, this tells me about the lack of moral compass in professional baseball players. That Astros team wasn't full of morally bankrupt individuals outside the norm of baseball. It was full of modern day baseball players all looking for an edge and not giving a shit about the purity of the game or who might be hurt.

2015 Yankees busted cheating. 2017 Yankees and Red Sox busted cheating. Dodgers busted cheating with laser pointers of some sort. 2018 Red Sox busted cheating. etc etc etc"

That's not my "vivid imagination"
That's you trying to minimize what the Astro team did.

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socaljim242 said:

This is you basically saying the astros were just doing what everyone else was doing or would do and the astro players are no different than any other team.
"So if anything, this tells me about the lack of moral compass in professional baseball players. That Astros team wasn't full of morally bankrupt individuals outside the norm of baseball. It was full of modern day baseball players all looking for an edge and not giving a shit about the purity of the game or who might be hurt.

2015 Yankees busted cheating. 2017 Yankees and Red Sox busted cheating. Dodgers busted cheating with laser pointers of some sort. 2018 Red Sox busted cheating. etc etc etc"

That's not my "vivid imagination"
That's you trying to minimize what the Astro team did.

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Hook'Em0608 said:

Okay to clarify my point some and make it specific to this Astros issue, so teams have been trying to steal signs since the invention of baseball. Everybody agrees with this. If you figure out the other teams signs, it’s okay to tell the batter what is coming if you have a runner on second base, but no other time. It’s okay to use a camera feed to try to help figure these out, but you can only study this information before or after the game. All of these things are technically against the rules of course, but everyone accepts that they are allowed as long as you do them exactly like I’ve stated.

Oh, and if the pitcher does something slightly different for each type of pitch that helps the batter know what is coming, then it is generally regarded as the pitchers fault because DUH everyone knows that the batter is desperately looking for any indication to help him know what is coming.

Before anyone tries to claim I’m absolving the Astros of wrongdoing, that ain’t it. They cheated and should be punished. I just find the player outrage silly when the sport is completely shaped by unwritten rules, most of which are technically “cheating”. When a team is cheating, nobody seems to say anything until after the fact. So in reality, they don't really care if it's benefitting them at the time. So they have no moral high ground to stand on.

The only folks I sympathize with is the fans. I truly do feel bad for fans who had high quality teams capable of winning it all and we will never truly know who the best team was.

Click to expand...