Ex-A’s star Donaldson vows to share video of cheating pitchers originally appeared on NBC Sports Bayarea
Former Athletics pitcher and current team TV broadcaster Dallas Braden believes Joe West confiscating a pitcher’s hat Wednesday opened up a can of worms.
Minnesota Twins third baseman Josh Donaldson, Braden’s former teammate and a fan favorite in Oakland, disagreed.
Braden and Donaldson tweeted back-and-forth hours after West confiscated St. Louis Cardinals right-hander Giovanny Gallegos’ hat for having a foreign substance on his hat. In that same game, a 4-0 win over the Chicago White Sox, West ejected St. Louis manager Mike Shildt for arguing the call.
The former pitcher tweeted that West “backed his umpires [and MLB] into a corner.” The active hitter argued West’s confiscation should be a wake-up call to pitchers.
Braden elaborated in a reply to Donaldson, noting that the substances pitchers currently use are much different than those of their predecessors. Donaldson took it a step further, offering to expose his pitching peers with “an entire catalog of these guys cheating.”
Braden expanded further Thursday in an interview on “A’s Pregame Live.” Once MLB umpires start peeling back the onion, Braden said they might not like what they see.
“Look, it’s a time and a place in our game where it’s a combination of so much,” Braden explained Thursday on “A’s Pregame Live.” “The data. The information that’s available. The evolution of the art of developing and creating pitches. The combination of velocity — the raw power that these athletes possess today is greater than ever before.
“You combine all of these things, with the advancement of technology in terms of substances as well that can start to be applied to baseballs that affect movement, and affect the ability to create movement, and generate spin and movement on the baseball. Now we are in a completely different world, and the point was: We all understand the difference between rosin, between sunscreen and what kind of tact that creates. … When you start to realize why the lack of offense has occurred, and you think about all the things I’ve just mentioned … you have to start to factor in every other little thing, and that’s where, unfortunately, the stick situation of substance use starts to come into play.”
Shildt called pitchers using foreign substances MLB’s “dirty little secret,” taking specific issue with the time and place in which West decided to expose it. Braden echoed those sentiments on Twitter and on “A’s Pregame Live.”
Based on his tweets Wednesday, Donaldson seems to think West didn’t go for enough.