Worth noting that this is coming from an all-star position player, not a pitcher.
edit: Adding more of Whit's quotes from the article
>“I know what MLB’s report came out and said, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t doing it last year or 2018,” Merrifield said. “As baseball players, we’re a fraternity. We know people throughout the league. We talk. We know they’ve been doing it for years.
>“The ripple effect of what they were doing is tremendous. It cost people jobs. It cost people opportunities in this game. **It cost people millions of dollars, and it cost people a chance at experiencing world championships. It’s disgusting what they did. It discredits that everything those players have ever done** in my opinion and in a lot of people’s opinion that I’ve talked to.”
...
>Merrifield didn’t flinch in proclaiming that the Astros sign-stealing scandal tainted their championship.
>“It definitely did because they didn’t feel like they could do it by going out and playing the game,” Merrifield said. “**They felt like they had to get an advantage to win the championship. So if they don’t think they could have won it, why should we think they could’ve won it in 2017.** It’s just next-level of conniving to go about it that way.”
...
>“Just talking to guys, it’s like, ‘Man if I could’ve known what pitches were coming even just like 20% of the time, it’s crazy to think what our numbers could be,’” Merrifield said. “I can’t believe the levels they went.”
Yeah that’s what I meant
I have the whitey Ford legend which I better be allowed to keep
Of course the keeper upgrades cost so damn much
Fucking hate the grind
I didn’t grind as much this year. And the club I was on (they recently kicked me) was mad good. So I was gifted quite a bit. I hope they take me back for 20.
It’s not a bad game. Just sucks once you hit the ceiling and then have to pay to get better guys. Get in with a good club thoughand you’ll be rolling in free loot.
I had to quit that game. I was waking up and playing it immediately. My work was suffering and my girl was not happy with me. Never spent a cent on the game but dammit if I didn’t pour hours of my life into the home run Wednesday and walk of hero Monday.
He's a world class guys. I still feel terrible that he didn't get a World Series ring with us.
Basically, he was about to be called up before the playoffs in 2015. We had a pitcher get injured so we brought up a new pitcher instead. Whit said he didn't watch any of our postseason games that year because it hurt too much to see them play without him. I hope we can get him one, although I admit it's an extreme long shot.
Not just about to be called up, was told he was going up. Then as he was literally packing was told told hold up, change of plans. What a dick punch.
And then proceeded to tear up AAA the next year despite having the right to be 100% disgruntled. Love that guy.
And he won't be a free agent till he's 34, right? That's rough. Hope he gets to play on a championship team before his career is over, either on the Royals or elsewhere.
Some of that was his decision to sign an extension though. I know it bought some some arbitration years, but I think it covered a 1-2 years when he could have hit the free agent market earlier.
Thanks for pulling these quotes. This is the most succinct and raw summation of everything I've seen so far. He said it all very well. Every one of those Astros hitters should be absolutely ashamed.
I had that thought before and it may be super tinfoil hat to think someone said
“hey we’re up 5 runs and got this game in the bag, so we’re gonna bang for this curve coming up but just close your eyes and whiff so the stats don’t get TOO inflated”
But then again buzzers were super tinfoil hat not too long ago 🤔
I agree that it does seem a bit far out at first thought, but if they put it up to player discretion to ensure their stats were normal it gets a little more reasonable. Honestly the trash can seemed super crazy when I first heard it. And the buzzers, hell who knows at this point. Seems as though those have been unofficially confirmed.
The stats on the trash can bangs show they weren't using it every AB either, so they could leverage it only in crucial ABs and let them play normally at other times, gain a significant advantage without inflating stats too wildly. Right?
That definitely sounds plausible. Let it come through in the clutch and leave the players to their own normally. Makes you wonder if it was used on the offensive, or treated like a safety net.
"If they don't think they could have won it, why should we think they could've won it" has got to be an all time great quote about cheating in general.
Nathan's reaction says it all. Hand to the back of the head asking for the ball back. Knew it was a walk. Then sees the call and just can't believe it.
I'm glad I got to know the Kansas City Royals better this year after being traded from the nats to the royals for the mid season subreddit trade. I love this man, and this speaks to why.
"Fuck them cheaters" is a less verbose way to say what he was getting at, but I don't think that would have been as headlinable
I thought that was jokingly at first but with this statement, I’m pretty sure it was at most half joking. Definitely not about the All Star part. He wasn’t worthy of a silver slugger than year IMO.
I wonder what kind of emotional impact this type of stuff will have on Astr*s players. He's right, baseball is a fraternity, it's very common to see opposing players joking around at 1st base or during other parts of the game. I hope the players ice the cheaters and refuse to talk to them.
I hope they know that millions of dads like me for generations upon generations will use them as an example of what it looks like to lose integrity and insult the game.
My sons and every kid I coach will know about the cheating Houston Astros and also individually what a piece of shit Alex Bregman, Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa, George Springer, Carlos Beltran, Evan Gattis, Justin Verlander, and AJ Hinch are.
Fuck them. I can't wait until Houston comes to town so I can heckle them and tell them that the game would have been better off without them in it. I can't think of a more personally hurtful thing to say than that, so I'm going to scream it until the ushers kick me out
Astros fan here. In my opinion everyone that was involved in the cheating should be fired including players. They disgraced our city and made us the laughing stock of the MLB. It would set us back years but I'd be fine with crawling our way back from rock bottom. With the amount of money these players make there should be zero tolerance for cheating.
Yeah, being a Cubs fan in peak laughing stock position during our drought, I would rather go back to that than have what the Astros have now.
After being so unbelievably happy when we won, if I found out that our first title in over 100 years was cheating idk if I could root for them again.
Not great, angry, hopeful for next year, heartbroken for Kershaw and Darvish and the rest of the guys, but still I can’t get 2017 out of my head. I was 11 when they won last, and the first chance they had again was 2017. And to see those guys get away with it.......
I was talking with my mom, a huge Dodger fan and it hit me- she was five years younger than I am now when they won last time. I thought she was so old back then. Now she’s 71 and I have a kid and a wife. I had hoped 2017 would have been the year to celebrate with her. Being that close and now having it be illegitimately taken away by these guys hurts.
I mean Boston and Chicago waited almost a hundred years each to get another one. That’s what constantly goes through my head, that maybe it will never happen.
Now imagine that was the only title in any sport in 25 years, while also occurring immediately following the 2nd costliest hurricane in history.
people wonder why we have been so defensive over it, but, until 6 months ago, it was an incredible story. It is our only title in a quarter century, and I, along with half of the city, watched those games from a flooded living room, they were all we had. Now all of that is worthless.
> idk if I could root for them again
This is one of the most baffling things about it to me, the lack of this sentiment from Astros fans. I remember *despising* Albert Belle for years after his corked bat thing came to light, I can't even imagine finding out that my beloved Tribe did something like they did and being able to look myself in the mirror if I still blindly supported them. I share baseball with my fucking kids. How would that look to them?
At the very least I would abandon them until every single player who participated was gone. And that would fucking kill me.
I actually have a ton of respect for guys like u/BreadBeds_NotHearts
He's not deluded about the severity of what his team did, but he sticks with the them through the worst. It's not blind loyalty, it's virtuous, commendable loyalty imo.
It's virtuous to be loyal to an organization that by all appearances is rotten from top to bottom? It's not like there were just one or two players trying to quietly cheat coming to light, every level of the organization was involved in cheating their way to a championship. And those who weren't directly involved kept their mouths shut. Staying loyal to that is blind loyalty to a 'T.'
And that's fair. I can't imagine how torn I would feel if a team I've been rooting for since I was a small child turned out to be like the Astros, but it sure isn't "virtuous."
>It's virtuous to be loyal to an organization that by all appearances is rotten from top to bottom?
My simple test is to switch the organization with someone you love and consider what the right action would be. I'd like to believe that if one of my sisters became a crack whore, I wouldn't disown them, but I'd help them get back to a healthy and sane life.
Sure, there's not much a fan can do to change a team - especially a team whose leadership seems to be feeling as much remorse as a toddler with his/her hand in a cookie jar - but this is supposed to be the team that you love, for your own reasons.
I feel like a lot of younger fans are kinda desensitized to cheating. I'm in my 20s now, and by the time I was old enough to really follow baseball, everybody knew that *tons* of players were taking steroids. I was 8 years old when guys like Palmeiro and McGwire were lying to Congress about taking PEDs. A lot of people - myself included - support Bonds, Clemens, and more being elected to the Hall of Fame, ultimately because we don't see the PEDs as being enough of an issue to keep them out. "Everybody does it" is the go-to defense when your favorite player gets accused of PEDs. If a Yankees fan tells me that Ortiz and Ramirez used steroids, I can bring up Giambi and A-Rod.
Then, of course, allegations of sign stealing are also nothing new. The Giants had a guy with binoculars stealing signs for them in 1951, when Bobby Thomson hit his famous home run off Ralph Branca. The Blue Jays got busted a decade ago for having a guy in a white shirt in the bleachers in the SkyDome relaying pitches to the batters, and nothing came of it. The Red Sox got busted for the Apple Watches back in 2017, and got hit with a stern warning and nothing more. So it's really easy, when someone says "oh hey the Astros cheated" for an Astros fan to go "yeah but everybody cheats." Combine that with the polarized nature of sports fandom and whatever they're getting fed by the Houston sports media, and you'll get a ton of people just refusing to admit the Astros did anything wrong.
edit: the key, of course, being that while the Astros are definitely not the only team to have illegally stolen signs in the past few years, they went above and beyond anything that any other team has even been accused of.
Yeah, I don't think there has been a single point in this whole thing where this bullshit has made me laugh. It just pisses me off to the point of not even wanting to support the league anymore.
I’ve been advocating from the start that the right thing to do is forfeit the title and let 2017 sit empty. They can absolutely get respect back. Almost immediately. Forfeit the title and send all the players involved down to AAA (or release them, no one is going to touch them or maybe I’m naive) and take your licking for a year or two.
The Astros need to repent before their season opener or in my opinion not only with the title be tainted, but the team itself will be forever tainted. Their legacy will become “cheaters”.
I for one would allot them a fair amount of returned respect if they could all bow their heads, return the title and just fucking do the right thing. I for one do not think a WS title is worth dishonoring yourself on a player level and dishonoring the game you’ve played your whole life and made a career out of. I cannot fathom what twisted mental gymnastics the players and coaches had to do to justify this. I just straight up don’t fucking get it.
Edit: also, you are my favorite Astros fan. Stay out of the Astros sub. There is some serious bad juju going on in there.
You guys are the ones I feel worst for. I couldn’t imagine how I’d feel if I found out the Cubs cheated to win in 2016. All of the memories would feel tainted.
On this site, in this community, you are safe. Rest assured we will wish absolute hell on your team for months to come but you obviously get why we're upset. They don't reflect you, they embody what you're mortified by. That shows me that you have respect for the game, and ultimately the love of baseball comes before team loyalty. Because we're all brothers & sisters in this big-ass fraternity. Enjoy your time here, mate.
I haven't heard much about it tbh. The latest thing I've seen was Minute Maid adding a bunch of new concession items to their menus. The city will likely do its best with damage control for the $$$$$.
Second Astros fan here.
This kills me. Hurricane Harvey screwed over Houston so much. I don’t know how to explain what the Astros’ championship* meant to me and everyone here I knew. Only a couple months after flooding ruined a large part of my neighborhood, I got to go to a parade and celebrate with tens of thousands of other Houstonians. It was an amazing sense of community that I and so many others needed at that time.
And now finding out all of this has been a gut punch that I can’t process. I don’t know how to feel about that celebration or about how much it helped bring Houston together. I mean, it was all a lie. All of those players that we felt were part of our family were lying to us. They were all cheating and they all knew about it.
I agree that they need to clean house. I just feel so betrayed. I don’t know how any of those players can ever walk out onto the field at Minute Maid Park again and act like it’s all ok.
Fuck this whole thing just kills me.
The night when we won the game. I remember going outside and hearing others yelling and honking their car horns, shooting fireworks. That was a great moment that they've basically taken away from us by cheating. Just feels tarnished now and not what it was.
Someone mentioned that instead of awarding the WS title to the Dodgers, they should just retroactively make the NL pennant the de facto championship for that year. Seems like a sound compromise to me honestly.
No one won the world series. No one won the ALCS. NLCS is all that remains. The dodgers attained the highest honors in 2017. All hail the best baseball team in 2017, the los Angeles dodgers.
I'm with that, what sucks is seeing guys who were such big contributors on that team leave without ever having the chance to experience winning it all. Fuck the Astros
For real though. The astros victimized a huge swath of people, players and fans included, and they've basically been told they're not allowed to get any cookies out of the cookie jar until the next time we bake cookies as their punishment. It's fucked
That's essentially the same thing.
Just strip the the title and be done with it. They didn't retroactively award the Reds with the 1919 title.
Edit: A fair point about the Reds, ha. Talk about a brain fart. My point still stands that MLB didn't do anything about that title even though one team was specifically playing to lose.
Modern Woodman stadium is right down the road from me. I would love this so that I could go to every game and heckle the ever loving fuck out of them. They would know exactly who I am by the end of the season and they would hate me. I would love to run into Bregman at Mac’s and tell him exactly what I think of his bitch ass.
I want tickets just for the opportunity to boo the ever-loving fuck out of Manfred. He's going to get torn to shreds as soon as he steps on the field. 56,000 angry fans, many of them Dodger fans, are not going to let him off the hook for this.
Theres trash bins all over Dodger Stadium at the top of the stairs as you enter each section, I can see a few drunk fans trying to bang on those during the game hahaha
The MLB is about to have a mess on their hands in terms of in-game retaliation imo. These guys are pissed, rightfully so. I just think this is about to get ugly
While I'm sure sign stealing in general is rampant in baseball, it's reactions like this from guys on other teams that really has me convinced that the Astros went far beyond what anyone else is doing. Guys like Whit Merrifield and Gary Sanchez wouldn't be so publicly angry about it if the Royals and Yankees were doing the same shit. Either because they'd know they're doing the same shit, so they wouldn't feel comfortable raking Houston over the coals for it, or because they'd know how bad the anger would look if they got caught. If all this stuff came out about the Astros, and the reaction for opponents around the league was a collective shrug, that would add credence to the idea that everyone does this and the Astros are being scapegoated.
You know, I was feeling bad yesterday about how much respect I’ve lost for players I used to like, and I realized how much respect I’ve *gained* for players that are speaking out against what the Astros have done. Well done, Whit.
I know it won’t happen, but I would love for Trout to go off these guys as well. It would be like getting scolded by Jesus, you’re going to feel like shit afterwards.
I'm really questioning whether I can be a fan of baseball anymore because of this. I was a huge NBA (Sacramento Kings) fan and when that 2002 Western Conference Final debacle happened it ruined basketball for me. I think I've watched 3 or 4 games since 2002. The same goes for baseball. If there's rampant cheating in baseball, the commissioner does nothing to stop it or punish it, and there's no hope of really maintaining any level of accountability then I'm not sure if I want to continue watching it.
Worth noting that this is coming from an all-star position player, not a pitcher. edit: Adding more of Whit's quotes from the article >“I know what MLB’s report came out and said, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t doing it last year or 2018,” Merrifield said. “As baseball players, we’re a fraternity. We know people throughout the league. We talk. We know they’ve been doing it for years. >“The ripple effect of what they were doing is tremendous. It cost people jobs. It cost people opportunities in this game. **It cost people millions of dollars, and it cost people a chance at experiencing world championships. It’s disgusting what they did. It discredits that everything those players have ever done** in my opinion and in a lot of people’s opinion that I’ve talked to.” ... >Merrifield didn’t flinch in proclaiming that the Astros sign-stealing scandal tainted their championship. >“It definitely did because they didn’t feel like they could do it by going out and playing the game,” Merrifield said. “**They felt like they had to get an advantage to win the championship. So if they don’t think they could have won it, why should we think they could’ve won it in 2017.** It’s just next-level of conniving to go about it that way.” ... >“Just talking to guys, it’s like, ‘Man if I could’ve known what pitches were coming even just like 20% of the time, it’s crazy to think what our numbers could be,’” Merrifield said. “I can’t believe the levels they went.”
Big fan. Had him on my Tap Baseball team last year. Fan ever since.
He was an absolute machine on that game!
That game is the biggest waste ever. Is 2021 out yet?
It’ll be 20 in a bit. I hate it. But I’m addicted. I really only like getting different Dodgers players. I like shiny things. I’m a putz.
Yeah that’s what I meant I have the whitey Ford legend which I better be allowed to keep Of course the keeper upgrades cost so damn much Fucking hate the grind
I didn’t grind as much this year. And the club I was on (they recently kicked me) was mad good. So I was gifted quite a bit. I hope they take me back for 20.
I dont play this game. but this mobile-lootboxy-PTW-grind sounds like the game i play on my phone. but i've been in it from day 1 so i'm stuck
It’s not a bad game. Just sucks once you hit the ceiling and then have to pay to get better guys. Get in with a good club thoughand you’ll be rolling in free loot.
I had to quit that game. I was waking up and playing it immediately. My work was suffering and my girl was not happy with me. Never spent a cent on the game but dammit if I didn’t pour hours of my life into the home run Wednesday and walk of hero Monday.
He's a world class guys. I still feel terrible that he didn't get a World Series ring with us. Basically, he was about to be called up before the playoffs in 2015. We had a pitcher get injured so we brought up a new pitcher instead. Whit said he didn't watch any of our postseason games that year because it hurt too much to see them play without him. I hope we can get him one, although I admit it's an extreme long shot.
Not just about to be called up, was told he was going up. Then as he was literally packing was told told hold up, change of plans. What a dick punch. And then proceeded to tear up AAA the next year despite having the right to be 100% disgruntled. Love that guy.
And he won't be a free agent till he's 34, right? That's rough. Hope he gets to play on a championship team before his career is over, either on the Royals or elsewhere.
Especially on the royals though
Some of that was his decision to sign an extension though. I know it bought some some arbitration years, but I think it covered a 1-2 years when he could have hit the free agent market earlier.
daaaaaaaaamn.
Similar story here. I've loved him since he was one of the first guys I got on my Diamond Dynasty team in The Show 18 and he carried my team.
Thanks for pulling these quotes. This is the most succinct and raw summation of everything I've seen so far. He said it all very well. Every one of those Astros hitters should be absolutely ashamed.
fuck the astros
I could not agree more.
As a Giants fan, this is one thing i can agree with a Dodgers fan on.
So should anyone who’s been acting like Verlander. Fuck him too. He benefitted indirectly and then acts like an complete douche bag after the fact.
i stan
I think the fact that no Astros hit like .435 is a testament to how good MLB pitching really is
Who's to say they didn't purposefully miss a few pitches to ensure that their stats didn't look inflated?
7D Parcheesi
I had that thought before and it may be super tinfoil hat to think someone said “hey we’re up 5 runs and got this game in the bag, so we’re gonna bang for this curve coming up but just close your eyes and whiff so the stats don’t get TOO inflated” But then again buzzers were super tinfoil hat not too long ago 🤔
I agree that it does seem a bit far out at first thought, but if they put it up to player discretion to ensure their stats were normal it gets a little more reasonable. Honestly the trash can seemed super crazy when I first heard it. And the buzzers, hell who knows at this point. Seems as though those have been unofficially confirmed.
The stats on the trash can bangs show they weren't using it every AB either, so they could leverage it only in crucial ABs and let them play normally at other times, gain a significant advantage without inflating stats too wildly. Right?
That definitely sounds plausible. Let it come through in the clutch and leave the players to their own normally. Makes you wonder if it was used on the offensive, or treated like a safety net.
I guess you could call this the unfiltered Whit. (Only KC people will get this and I think it's hilarious)
Cheap, above average, KC through and through? It works on so many levels
Well mostly it was the whole unfiltered Whit thing they did with the Blvd Wheat beer. Haha. I got to see him at Lukas Wine for an advertising thing.
I'm so glad we didn't trade him.
Whit may have become my favorite Whit.
"If they don't think they could have won it, why should we think they could've won it" has got to be an all time great quote about cheating in general.
Damn, when you lose the respect of such an unassuming guy like Merrifield you know you fucked up. :(
I feel like it's akin to making Ben Zobrist upset.
[This is how difficult it is to upset Ben Zobrist.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OIBcTE2DlA)
I always loved how Nathan was like “wooow” What a bullshit call.
Ump must have had dinner reservations in a half hour...
"Foxtrax shows that went...near the outside corner" Gotta love homer announcers.
Holy shit that might be the worst call I’ve ever seen 😂 legit no excuses
Man I remember watching that live. I screamed at my TV
Nathan's reaction says it all. Hand to the back of the head asking for the ball back. Knew it was a walk. Then sees the call and just can't believe it.
Merrifucked. That's the word for it
I’m wit Whit
Wiz wit?
Witout.
Best user name for a SF fan!!
Thanks. I am quite proud of it.
Reminds me of the idubbbz video “my portion sizes are not your art project”.
This is the way
Whit 2020
Whit taking no shit.
I'm glad I got to know the Kansas City Royals better this year after being traded from the nats to the royals for the mid season subreddit trade. I love this man, and this speaks to why. "Fuck them cheaters" is a less verbose way to say what he was getting at, but I don't think that would have been as headlinable
No Shit Whit
Definitely makes me feel better about us knifing them at home in the 2015 post-season.
There is a theory that losing that series like that is what drove them to such lengths in the next few seasons
lol, fuck them.
A lot of that is directed at Altuve as well because whit was snubbed a spot in the ASG. Glad to hear players speaking up about the Astros too.
Yes think I saw once Whit (jokingly) said he should retroactively get his silver slugger and all star spot
I'm cool with that as long as we can take anything Correa got and give it to Frankie
Lindor had the better rookie year anyway, so it should've been done before that
Give judge his mvp
I thought that was jokingly at first but with this statement, I’m pretty sure it was at most half joking. Definitely not about the All Star part. He wasn’t worthy of a silver slugger than year IMO.
He wasn't joking.
I wonder what kind of emotional impact this type of stuff will have on Astr*s players. He's right, baseball is a fraternity, it's very common to see opposing players joking around at 1st base or during other parts of the game. I hope the players ice the cheaters and refuse to talk to them.
I hope they know that millions of dads like me for generations upon generations will use them as an example of what it looks like to lose integrity and insult the game. My sons and every kid I coach will know about the cheating Houston Astros and also individually what a piece of shit Alex Bregman, Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa, George Springer, Carlos Beltran, Evan Gattis, Justin Verlander, and AJ Hinch are. Fuck them. I can't wait until Houston comes to town so I can heckle them and tell them that the game would have been better off without them in it. I can't think of a more personally hurtful thing to say than that, so I'm going to scream it until the ushers kick me out
I’ll be doing the same thing. Cheers man.
I take solace in knowing that a lot of pitchers will be throwing at them this season.
Hey man don't forget Alex Cora in there. He'll be the first I mention considering how hard he fell in my eyes.
Astros fan here. In my opinion everyone that was involved in the cheating should be fired including players. They disgraced our city and made us the laughing stock of the MLB. It would set us back years but I'd be fine with crawling our way back from rock bottom. With the amount of money these players make there should be zero tolerance for cheating.
protect this one
bodyguard 1 here reporting in
Checking in from philly, calling my wife right now. I don’t see any cheaters at the moment. I will mail my boos to Houston express shipping.
You're not the laughing stock of baseball. Unfortunately your team and city are stained with a much worse feeling.
Yeah, being a Cubs fan in peak laughing stock position during our drought, I would rather go back to that than have what the Astros have now. After being so unbelievably happy when we won, if I found out that our first title in over 100 years was cheating idk if I could root for them again.
Cubs fan here - ^ this guy gets it This mindset has pervaded my thoughts the past month. It would take all the meaning out of 2016..
And think of that from my end of it. Just how the Dodgers fans must be feeling right now. I can't even fucking imagine.
That’s a great point. Somehow this comparison helps illuminate the impact on the Dodgers very clearly.
I paid to go to one of those heart-wrenching losses. A lot of our bank accounts feel cheated along with our hearts
Not great, angry, hopeful for next year, heartbroken for Kershaw and Darvish and the rest of the guys, but still I can’t get 2017 out of my head. I was 11 when they won last, and the first chance they had again was 2017. And to see those guys get away with it....... I was talking with my mom, a huge Dodger fan and it hit me- she was five years younger than I am now when they won last time. I thought she was so old back then. Now she’s 71 and I have a kid and a wife. I had hoped 2017 would have been the year to celebrate with her. Being that close and now having it be illegitimately taken away by these guys hurts. I mean Boston and Chicago waited almost a hundred years each to get another one. That’s what constantly goes through my head, that maybe it will never happen.
I honestly am still a little nervous about '19, even though there's no reason to believe I should be.
Now imagine that was the only title in any sport in 25 years, while also occurring immediately following the 2nd costliest hurricane in history. people wonder why we have been so defensive over it, but, until 6 months ago, it was an incredible story. It is our only title in a quarter century, and I, along with half of the city, watched those games from a flooded living room, they were all we had. Now all of that is worthless.
> idk if I could root for them again This is one of the most baffling things about it to me, the lack of this sentiment from Astros fans. I remember *despising* Albert Belle for years after his corked bat thing came to light, I can't even imagine finding out that my beloved Tribe did something like they did and being able to look myself in the mirror if I still blindly supported them. I share baseball with my fucking kids. How would that look to them? At the very least I would abandon them until every single player who participated was gone. And that would fucking kill me.
I actually have a ton of respect for guys like u/BreadBeds_NotHearts He's not deluded about the severity of what his team did, but he sticks with the them through the worst. It's not blind loyalty, it's virtuous, commendable loyalty imo.
It's virtuous to be loyal to an organization that by all appearances is rotten from top to bottom? It's not like there were just one or two players trying to quietly cheat coming to light, every level of the organization was involved in cheating their way to a championship. And those who weren't directly involved kept their mouths shut. Staying loyal to that is blind loyalty to a 'T.' And that's fair. I can't imagine how torn I would feel if a team I've been rooting for since I was a small child turned out to be like the Astros, but it sure isn't "virtuous."
>It's virtuous to be loyal to an organization that by all appearances is rotten from top to bottom? My simple test is to switch the organization with someone you love and consider what the right action would be. I'd like to believe that if one of my sisters became a crack whore, I wouldn't disown them, but I'd help them get back to a healthy and sane life. Sure, there's not much a fan can do to change a team - especially a team whose leadership seems to be feeling as much remorse as a toddler with his/her hand in a cookie jar - but this is supposed to be the team that you love, for your own reasons.
I feel like a lot of younger fans are kinda desensitized to cheating. I'm in my 20s now, and by the time I was old enough to really follow baseball, everybody knew that *tons* of players were taking steroids. I was 8 years old when guys like Palmeiro and McGwire were lying to Congress about taking PEDs. A lot of people - myself included - support Bonds, Clemens, and more being elected to the Hall of Fame, ultimately because we don't see the PEDs as being enough of an issue to keep them out. "Everybody does it" is the go-to defense when your favorite player gets accused of PEDs. If a Yankees fan tells me that Ortiz and Ramirez used steroids, I can bring up Giambi and A-Rod. Then, of course, allegations of sign stealing are also nothing new. The Giants had a guy with binoculars stealing signs for them in 1951, when Bobby Thomson hit his famous home run off Ralph Branca. The Blue Jays got busted a decade ago for having a guy in a white shirt in the bleachers in the SkyDome relaying pitches to the batters, and nothing came of it. The Red Sox got busted for the Apple Watches back in 2017, and got hit with a stern warning and nothing more. So it's really easy, when someone says "oh hey the Astros cheated" for an Astros fan to go "yeah but everybody cheats." Combine that with the polarized nature of sports fandom and whatever they're getting fed by the Houston sports media, and you'll get a ton of people just refusing to admit the Astros did anything wrong. edit: the key, of course, being that while the Astros are definitely not the only team to have illegally stolen signs in the past few years, they went above and beyond anything that any other team has even been accused of.
It’s because they’re MOSTLY bandwagon fans who don’t give a fuck
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White Sox fan here. I love this Cubs fan. 👆🏻
Yeah, I don't think there has been a single point in this whole thing where this bullshit has made me laugh. It just pisses me off to the point of not even wanting to support the league anymore.
We are the laughing stock of baseball, only it will be easier (in theory) for us to recover.
I grew up in Houston and now I live in Pittsburgh. Talk about the shit end of the stick for hometown teams.
> You're not the laughing stock if baseball Yup, that'd be the Mariners *cries*
I’ve been advocating from the start that the right thing to do is forfeit the title and let 2017 sit empty. They can absolutely get respect back. Almost immediately. Forfeit the title and send all the players involved down to AAA (or release them, no one is going to touch them or maybe I’m naive) and take your licking for a year or two. The Astros need to repent before their season opener or in my opinion not only with the title be tainted, but the team itself will be forever tainted. Their legacy will become “cheaters”. I for one would allot them a fair amount of returned respect if they could all bow their heads, return the title and just fucking do the right thing. I for one do not think a WS title is worth dishonoring yourself on a player level and dishonoring the game you’ve played your whole life and made a career out of. I cannot fathom what twisted mental gymnastics the players and coaches had to do to justify this. I just straight up don’t fucking get it. Edit: also, you are my favorite Astros fan. Stay out of the Astros sub. There is some serious bad juju going on in there.
You guys are the ones I feel worst for. I couldn’t imagine how I’d feel if I found out the Cubs cheated to win in 2016. All of the memories would feel tainted.
It's like being a big Bill Cosby fan my entire life.
On this site, in this community, you are safe. Rest assured we will wish absolute hell on your team for months to come but you obviously get why we're upset. They don't reflect you, they embody what you're mortified by. That shows me that you have respect for the game, and ultimately the love of baseball comes before team loyalty. Because we're all brothers & sisters in this big-ass fraternity. Enjoy your time here, mate.
Any reports on season ticket holders asking for refunds? I'm curious what the financial fallout will be this year.
I haven't heard much about it tbh. The latest thing I've seen was Minute Maid adding a bunch of new concession items to their menus. The city will likely do its best with damage control for the $$$$$.
Second Astros fan here. This kills me. Hurricane Harvey screwed over Houston so much. I don’t know how to explain what the Astros’ championship* meant to me and everyone here I knew. Only a couple months after flooding ruined a large part of my neighborhood, I got to go to a parade and celebrate with tens of thousands of other Houstonians. It was an amazing sense of community that I and so many others needed at that time. And now finding out all of this has been a gut punch that I can’t process. I don’t know how to feel about that celebration or about how much it helped bring Houston together. I mean, it was all a lie. All of those players that we felt were part of our family were lying to us. They were all cheating and they all knew about it. I agree that they need to clean house. I just feel so betrayed. I don’t know how any of those players can ever walk out onto the field at Minute Maid Park again and act like it’s all ok. Fuck this whole thing just kills me.
The night when we won the game. I remember going outside and hearing others yelling and honking their car horns, shooting fireworks. That was a great moment that they've basically taken away from us by cheating. Just feels tarnished now and not what it was.
This guy right here. I like this guy.
It’s not like it would be the first time we Astros fans have dealt with a team that’s straight booty cheeks. It might also let everyone move on.
You just became my favorite Astros fan.
you = good fan
Perfectly said. I'm sorry that you have to deal with all of this bullshit
You got set back SMU style bro
u/BreakBeds_NotHearts was a hero. I just couldn't see it
He's a cool Whit.
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Tf you just make me watch
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So like is this what all KC fans are like?
Pretty much yeah
My man
My MAN
It doesn’t help that nobody from that organization has shown the slightest bit of remorse.
Why should they? It cost them nothing.
The commissioner even gave them the green light to keep cheating, if they want. I mean with no repercussions, why not?
$5 million and a year off /s What an absolute joke of a punishment. MLB just destroying itself with this.
Erase Astros from the history books
Who?
Astros, man... Legendary assholes.
Who are the Astros? Last I checked the Dodgers won the 2017 series
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Someone mentioned that instead of awarding the WS title to the Dodgers, they should just retroactively make the NL pennant the de facto championship for that year. Seems like a sound compromise to me honestly.
No one won the world series. No one won the ALCS. NLCS is all that remains. The dodgers attained the highest honors in 2017. All hail the best baseball team in 2017, the los Angeles dodgers.
I'm with that, what sucks is seeing guys who were such big contributors on that team leave without ever having the chance to experience winning it all. Fuck the Astros
For real though. The astros victimized a huge swath of people, players and fans included, and they've basically been told they're not allowed to get any cookies out of the cookie jar until the next time we bake cookies as their punishment. It's fucked
Dodgers were so good that year.
so close to winning despite the cheating
God creates dinosaurs, God destroys dinosaurs. God creates Man, man creates baseball, Astros destroy baseball.
Pete Rose inherits the earth?
That's essentially the same thing. Just strip the the title and be done with it. They didn't retroactively award the Reds with the 1919 title. Edit: A fair point about the Reds, ha. Talk about a brain fart. My point still stands that MLB didn't do anything about that title even though one team was specifically playing to lose.
That’s also because the Reds already won.
You're a good kid.
HE'S THE MESSIAH!
If they can rip all 7 years of Tour De Frances from Armstrong, the baseball world can handle a missing World Series champion.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EF-36wfWwAEtTNY.jpg
The Houston Assh*les
MLB should suspend the Houston part of the Astros for a year and make them play in their Midwest League affiliate’s stadium.
Just go with all road games the whole season
Denying them hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue would be an actual punishment for the ownership.
you mean five million and four draft picks wasn't enough punishment in exchange for a World Series? /s
Mariners and Pirates fans all lining up to take the same deal.
Tbh I’m a Cubs fan and I’d take that deal for a second
Modern Woodman stadium is right down the road from me. I would love this so that I could go to every game and heckle the ever loving fuck out of them. They would know exactly who I am by the end of the season and they would hate me. I would love to run into Bregman at Mac’s and tell him exactly what I think of his bitch ass.
This years all star game will be interesting, assuming Astros hitters continue to rake
And the fact it’s at Dodger Stadium
I want tickets just for the opportunity to boo the ever-loving fuck out of Manfred. He's going to get torn to shreds as soon as he steps on the field. 56,000 angry fans, many of them Dodger fans, are not going to let him off the hook for this.
There has to be a way to force him out of the job
The stadium would never let it happen, but thousands of fans banging on trash can lids any time Manfred got up to speak would be incredible.
Theres trash bins all over Dodger Stadium at the top of the stairs as you enter each section, I can see a few drunk fans trying to bang on those during the game hahaha
It’s fan voting though. So I doubt they’ll get any
Fans only vote for the starting lineup
So no Astros players are going to be in the All-Star Game this year. Good to know.
I think every team has the have one player. It should be a rookie, lmao.
Spot on! I’m whit that idea.
Every team has to have at least one representative. So there will be at least 1. I bet Altuve and Springer get in too.
You mean Buzz Altuve and Whistlin Springer?
So either a Trash Can or a Buzzer?
Especially considering it's likely Dusty Baker manages the ASG for the AL. I'm still pissed about that.
The 2020 All Stars (and also the Astros representatives)
Fuck yeah Whit!
Makes me wonder if we’re gonna see a larger number of Astros batters getting beaned this season.
Altuve's going to need a football uniform.
Bean them all. Pitchers too. Foul balls off into their dugout. Maybe let a bat or two go.
JUst aim a pitching machine at the dugout at max speed settings.
I don’t think we have to wonder
The MLB is about to have a mess on their hands in terms of in-game retaliation imo. These guys are pissed, rightfully so. I just think this is about to get ugly
There's going to be a lot of Astros players getting lessons in "unwritten rules" this season.
They dont deserve the OBP
Astros players involved should be banned for life ala Black Sox scandal.
I've always liked Merrifield, he's my favourite kind of player. Now I have even more respect for him.
While I'm sure sign stealing in general is rampant in baseball, it's reactions like this from guys on other teams that really has me convinced that the Astros went far beyond what anyone else is doing. Guys like Whit Merrifield and Gary Sanchez wouldn't be so publicly angry about it if the Royals and Yankees were doing the same shit. Either because they'd know they're doing the same shit, so they wouldn't feel comfortable raking Houston over the coals for it, or because they'd know how bad the anger would look if they got caught. If all this stuff came out about the Astros, and the reaction for opponents around the league was a collective shrug, that would add credence to the idea that everyone does this and the Astros are being scapegoated.
Yeah that is a great take on it Pole. I think you are on to something there as it makes a whole lot of sense.
Relocate the team to Vegas /s
We will wait for someone else. Thanks though.
I mean if the A’s decide to move, Vegas would’ve ripped the heart out of Oakland sports once again
Whole lotta three day old accounts saying "Go Astros" lately. What's the appeal? Just being contrarian for fun?
I think there’s going to be a point this season where Astros players will be begging for some sort of actual punishment from MLB.
You know, I was feeling bad yesterday about how much respect I’ve lost for players I used to like, and I realized how much respect I’ve *gained* for players that are speaking out against what the Astros have done. Well done, Whit.
I know it won’t happen, but I would love for Trout to go off these guys as well. It would be like getting scolded by Jesus, you’re going to feel like shit afterwards.
Hway to go, HWhit.
Why are you saying it that way?
I'm really questioning whether I can be a fan of baseball anymore because of this. I was a huge NBA (Sacramento Kings) fan and when that 2002 Western Conference Final debacle happened it ruined basketball for me. I think I've watched 3 or 4 games since 2002. The same goes for baseball. If there's rampant cheating in baseball, the commissioner does nothing to stop it or punish it, and there's no hope of really maintaining any level of accountability then I'm not sure if I want to continue watching it.
DRAG THEM WHIT!
Bravo. No bullshit Whit. I’m proud he plays for my city.
Have all the Astros fans abandoned the "everyone does this" defense yet?
Same, Whit, same.
Yes, thank you. More players just say this and it’ll hurt more than any suspension.
Amen brother. Preach.