Originally Posted by
King87
The Manfred report specifies that the Astros used their cheating system throughout the postseason of 2017 - full stop.
No qualifier, no addendum, nothing, just a full-stop indictment. Moreover, the tidbit with Altuve hitting that spectacular homer and then doing his best to stop his teammates from celebrating too hard and removing his shirt is pretty obvious regarding the buzzer controversy as well.
So your first claim about deep into the postseason is at best dubious, considering that it's on the record that: pitchers noticed that the Astros would especially hone in on off-speed pitches. In tandem with the fact that pitch that went yard, from Chapman, was an offspeed pitch, you'd have to be doing mental gymnastics to try to contort your way around this. You can try, but please be aware that no one who isn't an Astros fan is going to give that the time of day.
Your next about Darvish might be true, but that's a distractor - one can gain an advantage in a manner deemed above board in sports culture while also gaining another advantage in a more nefarious way- from the point, and is a red herring fallacy. You would have to be able to disprove the notion that you cheated. The onus falls upon the cheaters to do so, because there's a far presumption that when you cheated in the postseason, you'll continue to do so; it's why no one buys that you didn't cheat in the World Series, including the players, fans, managers, and media en masse.
The last bit of your argument is prima facie valid, but doesn't necessarily mean what you purport it to mean: teams in sports sometimes are better on the road than at home, there are obvious examples and reasons, that are obvious. You might have faced better pitchers more often during one particular split; your team might have tried harder on the road for any number of psychological reasons (including partying more at home, feeling comfortable with a normal advantage being home), or it could just be variance, etc.
However, there's a final nail in the coffin: you claim that the Astros stopped cheating with their system. That it was a failure. If it was a failure, if it didn't help, if it bore no fruit, then tell me why, on the record, the Astros didn't just continue to update their system (this is widely documented) throughout twenty-seventeen, but continued to do so in 2018?
The answer is pretty obvious, it was fruitful. This only bolsters my assertion that they were cheating for a reason and that the assertion of 'well we were better on the road' doesn't equate into 'it had no effect and meant nothing' otherwise the Astros, who were able to design a masterful cheating system that most of the players were in on were also dumb enough to gamble everything on a cheating system that had no payoff.
There's a reason why the Astros are so hated, why the organization is no longer respected, and why no one respect that World Series trophy, and why the rest of the players despise the Astros: everyone is aware of what you did, and it was a massive controversy when the Commissioner didn't have the stones to put an * on that title, or to strip it away.
It is a hollow championship devoid of merit, and it will never mean anything to the world at large.
MLB players caught using foreign substances on balls to be ejected, suspended for 10 games
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