On Tuesday, the Red Sox got caught red handed stealing signs from the Yankees during a recent series which was then confirmed by MLB as well. The Red Sox ‘fessed up to the entire thing and were apparently completely unapologetic about it, which makes the situation even better.
It’s a hilarious development between two rival teams that is a welcome jolt of entertainment for September baseball before the playoffs officially kick off next month. In fact, if there were more petty squabbles like this complaint/counter complaint extravaganza, more people might watch baseball. Or at least focus on more than what their own team is doing the majority of the time.
So, here’s a proposition for baseball: make all cheating legal. No matter the kind, the results, or the advantage it gives each team, cheating should be totally allowed throughout the entire league.
As was pointed out on Twitter, there are so many ways that a full-on cheating league could be a lot of fun.
I want a cheating-positive MLB. Steroids for all. Steal signs with periscopes and mirrors. Doctor the ball with fucking molasses. All of it
— Seth Rosenthal (@seth_rosenthal) September 5, 2017
Fucking managers with pirate telescopes and the ball boy operating a drone https://t.co/Ky1o4Mq6rD
— ☕netw3rk (@netw3rk) September 5, 2017
But focusing on sign stealing and steroids is only the tip of the iceberg. Teams should be able to do literally anything they want. Whatever their heart’s desire, let it happen.
If the Giants want to put a tree spring noose trap on the base paths when the Dodgers come to town, let them.
If the Red Sox decide that the Rays have to navigate an outfield with random spots of oil placed around during the last three innings of every game, then let them.
Heck, the White Sox should be allowed to put an entire Ninja Warrior course between the visitors dugout and the batter’s box when division opponents come to town if they so choose. WHY NOT?!
Throw all the anti-cheating rules out. Every last one of them. Spice up the game beyond the limits of reasonable game play, and then take a quick breather and spice them it up some more.
I want teams trying to throw other teams off their games in the clubhouse with pre-game stink bombs and only cold water in the showers at all times. Then I want those teams to play everything completely straight faced to reporters only to pat each other on the back later in front of the cameras to congratulate each other for cheating well done.
There should be sudden lighting outages in the middle of away team’s at-bats and the at-bats should still have to fully count no matter the outcome.
If one team decides it’s a great day to hit softballs instead of baseballs and a fan gets to slow pitch those softballs to the home team only, then great! Can’t imagine anything better in the world.
Break out the grease, the pine tar, the corked bats. Is there a better way to cheat with a bat these days than to cork it? THEN MAKE THAT HAPPEN, I SAY. Get the guys from NASA on it and figure out the most opportune ways.
I hope the Red Sox turn around and hire an entire department at Apple to figure out cutting edge cheating methods using iPhone capabilities that don’t even exist for the public yet. And then I want to the Red Sox to win 50 games in a row and be as smug as possible about it at all times.
If one team wants to use black hat hackers to break into another team’s internal scouting system then best of luck to them and I hope they choose their hackers well.
WHO. FREAKING. CARES.
Baseball needs fans, they’ll admit it themselves. It’s getting ridiculous that after every instance of gamesmanship or cheating all of baseball freaks out and starts wringing their hands about how severely it violates baseball’s very strict rules of decorum and what this means for the sport.
What it means for the sport is that people have something to talk about, something to laugh about, and something to focus on more than what win pace the Dodgers are on at this very moment. That’s boring. Openly cheating in new and creative ways is so much FUN for EVERYBODY.
Cheating is entertaining as heck. Everybody already does it (literally, everybody) so at this point tear down those proverbial fences and let everybody do what they want already. We’d all end up better off.