The Red Sox dominated the Dodgers in the World Series, but Dodgers fans are complaining that it wasn't on the level.
They've been circulating videos accusing Boston pitchers of CHEATING. There's one of Matt Barnes where he allegedly has a sticky substance on his forearm, and he touches it with his pitching hand before each pitch.
And there's one of David Price where he's patting his shirt with his hand, and his hand appears to STICK to his jersey.
The Barnes one isn't from the World Series. It's from Boston's previous series against the Astros. People were talking about it then . . . but nothing came of it.
The video of Price IS from the World Series, but his sticky hand is his GLOVE hand, so either he had pine tar on his jersey, or it was just sweat from his glove.
Pitchers using pine tar and other sticky substances IS illegal, but essentially everyone just looks the other way, because it's so commonplace now that their own teammates are probably doing the same thing.
Rule 6.02(c)(4) in baseball's rulebook states, quote, "The pitcher shall not apply a foreign substance of any kind to the ball." Violating the rule is grounds for immediate ejection and a 10-game suspension.
But it's unlikely that Major League Baseball will do anything about it, unless they decide to crack down on ALL pitchers in the future.
So it's like sign-stealing . . . it's technically against the rules, but it's also become ingrained in the gamesmanship of baseball.
For better or worse, baseball is FLOODED with all kinds of written and unwritten rules that are not always enforced with any sort of regularity. Some baseball analysts say that this rule was written when pitchers were using more extreme methods to cheat . . . and that most players are fine with pitchers using sunscreen and a little rosin to improve their grip before throwing a 100 mile-per-hour fastball. But they don't want to just drop the rule, because it could open it up for egregious offenses. So right now, it's one of those things you can get away with in a subtle way, as long as you're not flouting it.
Photo: Getty Images