U.S.S. Mariner’s Derek Zumsteg made the national papers and “SportsCenter” earlier this week with his carefully researched accusations that Angels closer Francisco Rodriguez has been doctoring the ball, using the underside of the bill of his cap to smear some kind of gooey goodness.
The Seattle Times’ Larry Stone observes the firestorm from afar (link swiped from Repoz and Baseball Prospectus).
“To my great shock,” Zumsteg said, “it became a huge deal. I probably had four or five people regularly reading my blog. I throw up a post and some photos after someone tipped me. A couple of days later, MLB is announcing they’re investigating Rodriguez. Pretty crazy.”
Zumsteg, one of the co-founders of the popular “U.S.S. Mariner” fan site, began posting his take on Rodriguez on the “Cheater’s Guide To Baseball Blog” he had started to support his book.
The thread, entitled “Francisco Rodriguez Doctoring the Ball,” included still photos from the television broadcast of the game, which revealed a mysterious white substance under the bill of F-Rod’s cap.
Zumsteg, in a pitch-by-pitch account of Rodriguez’s appearance, expounded with his impression that in some instances Rodriguez was being “blatant” in rubbing his thumb on the brim, and noted that those pitches appeared to have extra movement.
A blogstorm soon ensued. The Oakland A’s fan site “Athletics Nation” posted its own pictures of F-Rod’s hat. MVN.com chipped in with its take, including a video compilation of Rodriguez rubbing his hat. U.S.S. Mariner, an influential site in the blogosphere, mentioned the controversy, prompting more Web scrutiny.
It didn’t take long for word to reach New York, though Texas general manager Jon Daniels says the Rangers weren’t the ones to turn in Rodriguez. They didn’t have to.
“I got e-mailed that blog from a number of different people,” said Pat Courtney, MLB’s vice president of public relations. “I got it multiple times, and the same thing with other people in our office. I forwarded it to Bob Watson’s office [Watson is baseball’s VP of on-field operations] as an FYI, but they knew about it already.”
Angels GM Bill Stoneman said Friday that Watson had dropped his investigation of Rodriguez, which an MLB official confirmed to me Saturday.
Rodriguez has staunchly denied cheating, stating from the beginning that the substance on his cap was merely rosin transferred from his handling of the rosin bag.
That would still be technically illegal according to the letter of the rule prohibiting “foreign substances” on the ball. But Zumsteg recognizes “a sort of cultural tolerance for using stickem ” some sort of tacky substance. As long as you don’t use enough to affect the flight of the ball, people say, ‘Eh, whatever.’ “
F-Rod, meanwhile, let loose on Zumsteg to the Los Angeles Times.
“It’s easy for a guy sitting at his desk, watching television, to put pictures on the Internet,” he said. “But I hope he has something better to do than to mess with people. He has no clue what he’s writing about. I don’t even know who he is.”
Zumsteg was always skeptical MLB would take action on F-Rod “because they don’t want everyone on the Internet posting pictures” of suspected players, he said.
“What boggles my mind,” he added, “is that everyone is willing to believe some guy is on steroids on absolutely no evidence. Here’s a big smear under Rodriguez’s brim being shown on ESPN. He’s putting his thumb on it and getting clear movement, and people are e-mailing me and saying I made it up in Photoshop.”
What an interesting world we’d live in if, to borrow Rodriguez’ words, guys like Zumsteg did have something better to do than pay such close attention to the machinations of professional athletes. How much money do you think F-Rod would earn a year in such a climate?
The AL West leading Halos dropped their 2nd game of the season earlier today, as Joe Blanton and 4 A’s relievers combined to hold Los Angeles to just 6 hits and one earned run in Oakland’s 2-1 victory.