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How the internet helped crack the Astros' sign-stealing case
- CaliforniaKarl 7y agoJomboy Media is worth checking out, even if you don’t follow or care about baseball. His breakdowns are fun to watch. For example: https://youtu.be/W1pJRRJntUo https://youtu.be/W1pJRRJntUo
- wyxuan 7y agoI think the best part about the whole thing is that there are so many memes accompanying the investigation. I'm not sure however, that the internet really helped crack the case. Th article shows that the internet came to similar conclusions as the real MLB investigation.
- interestica 7y agoI'm fascinated by the shift in internet culture to allow this. In the early 2010s MLB would have done their best to remove unauthorized clips from the web. It would have always been done as 'copyright violation'. But, the shift democratizes the content itself - and makes it available for critique/analysis/comedy.
- OldHand2018 7y agoBaseball Savant [1] might just blow your mind. It is far and away the best stats/data site provided by a pro sports league, likely anywhere on Earth. The search page offers about 40 ways to narrow a search, and once you've found what you are looking for it can generate a dozen or two different charts and graphics. On many of them, any circle representing a pitch is a clickable link that brings up the TV video of that pitch. You really like the data you found? No problem, there's a button to download it in CSV format, with about 95 columns of data for each pitch. Do whatever you want with it as long as its non-commercial. There are conferences where people go and present research and other cool things they do with the data. MLB sends people to them and most teams do as well. If you present something cool, you'll have half a dozen teams asking you for an interview. [1] https://baseballsavant.mlb.com https://baseballsavant.mlb.com
- oplav 7y agoBaseball Savant includes videos for every pitch through 2017 [1]. You can get there through the search page [2]. [1] https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/sporty-videos?playId=62a1c77c-fa27-4f3b-85f3-43b98122b80f https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/sporty-videos?playId=62a1c77c... [2] https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/statcast_search https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/statcast_search
- bradleyankrom 7y agoThe research done by ordinary people (not league or club personnel) created a situation where the league had to respond. Without that, I don’t think an investigation would have taken place.
- wj 7y agoI read an article today from 2018 that mentioned the Astros banging trash cans. Apparently MLB has known about these allegations for a while and didn't investigate. It took it coming out on social media for them to finally launch the investigation.
- remarkEon 7y agoI assume there are some baseball fans here on HN ... This is, in my opinion, a watershed moment here for how Baseball is going to deal with technology. After the Moneyball "revolution" lots of people, both in the game and casual fans, talked about how technology would again "revolutionize" the sport[0]. Things like player evaluations and injury prediction + prevention were what was mostly talked about (this was back in ~2014-2015 or so). There really hasn't been much talk about this since then, as far as I can tell, or it's been kept as a trade secret by teams. What's happened with this Astros scandal is something else entirely. This was not the future of the game we wanted, and there will need to be a philosophical discussion had in short order about what we're going to allow in the future (what they did was not). Complicating all of this is that Houston winning the last game of the season in 2017 was largely viewed as a "victory" for the stats nerds over the traditionalists[1], and was predicted in 2014[2]. So the idea that the "technology" they used to do this wasn't just learning things other teams couldn't about their own players, but essentially a gimmick to steal signs not only casts a shadow on the integrity of the game but also calls into question the methodology itself to a certain extent - though to be honest I think the argument is pretty much over at this point on stats vs traditionalists. [0]https://www.si.com/mlb/2014/07/08/billy-beane-technology-will-revolutionize-baseball https://www.si.com/mlb/2014/07/08/billy-beane-technology-wil... [1]https://www.si.com/mlb/2017/10/24/houston-astros-sports-illustrated-world-series-prediction https://www.si.com/mlb/2017/10/24/houston-astros-sports-illu... [2]https://www.si.com/longform/astros/index.html https://www.si.com/longform/astros/index.html
- remote_phone 7y agoI’m waiting for machine learning to predict play calls for baseball and football. It shouldn’t be too hard if it hasn’t already been done. Based on the offensive coordinator and things like field position, etc it should be easy to make predictions as to what that human would make based on past choices. I wonder if that would be considered cheating though If they only used past performance and not real time signal stealing.
- remarkEon 7y agoIt is possible today to do this. The question is ... should we? I'm old school about this game and my answer is emphatically "no".
- markhalonen 7y agoThey will start training on coach body language, things like steps, leaning over, covering his mouth, head movement... I'm sure coaches have some kind of tell when they get excited about calling a play-action deep ball after the run game got 3 straight first downs.
- wolco 7y agoNo they use that now. They have stats for matchups vs where the ball will be hit, etc. Based on this the defensive will move. It has been working.
- anigbrowl 7y agoWhy not just use a cannon to shoot the ball? Ideas like yours take all the fun out of play and ruin it for everyone else. We all know we can build machines to do things better than humans, but so what? It's the uncertainty and imperfection and second guessing that makes a game enjoyable to watch or play in the first place.
- akiselev 7y agoThere's a lot of money and ego at stake in sports world. Enjoyment is a very distant concern.
- SubiculumCode 7y agoI will just say this. I am a Dodgers fan and Houston's cheating may well have ruined Kershaw's legacy, one of the best pitchers to have ever lived and played baseball. Shame shame Shame.
- dole 7y agoNot a Doyers and Kershaw fan, but I agree with his legacy. Glad to see Darvish vindicated if only a little bit.
- freehunter 7y agoSimilar for me as a Detroit fan with Justin Verlander. Half of me is glad to see his World Series win wasn’t revoked, but the other half says he was party to the cheating and should have been punished. But the shame is he’s one of the best pitchers in the game without cheating... why did he do it? Shame indeed.
- daseiner1 7y agoWell, yours is the converse, no? Kershaw lost in part to Houston's sign-stealing, Verlander won.
- rurban 7y agoAnd then Verlander lost against the Nationals, because they stole the signs to him. This is the most plausible explanation for his losses. And the internet didn't help there, rather the opposite.
- incompatible 7y agoFor the uninitiated, how do you steal signs by making a banging noise? What is a "sign", anyway? What electronics are involved? The article doesn't explain anything.
- trimbo 7y agoThe catcher will signal a pitch with their hand between their legs. One finger for a fastball, two for a curve, something like that. The reason this communication is necessary is so the catcher sets up correctly to catch e.g. a breaking ball. What the Astros did was zoom in a camera from the outfield to see this and feed that video straight into the dugout. The person in the dugout with the feed would bang a garbage can (or something) to signal audibly to the person up at bat. Knowing what pitch is coming is a massive advantage for a batter. It really has to happen in a matter of a second or two in order to work.
- thaumasiotes 7y agoI'm basing this on a single article I read that was a little more detailed. A "sign" is a hand signal the catcher makes to the pitcher, indicating which pitch (fastball / curveball / whatever) the pitcher will throw. If the pitcher wants to throw something else, he shakes his head, and the catcher signals something different. Repeat until the pitcher is happy. The pitcher's rejection is visible to everyone, but the catcher's signal is hidden. "Stealing signs" does not refer to stealing the key that translates between hand signals and pitch types, so that you can tell by looking at the signal what pitch will be thrown. That's considered obvious. (I mention this because I assumed that's what "stealing signs" would mean.) Instead, "stealing signs" refers to looking at the catcher when he signals, so that you see the signal. Interpreting it is then up to you. Oddly, this is explicitly legal if you do it by having a runner on second base, but illegal by any other means. The electronics involved are a small camera mounted somewhere aimed at the catcher. The banging noise is a simple code -- one bang for signal A; two bangs for signal B; three bangs for signal C... the function is to communicate the signal from the guy off in the bowels of the stadium viewing the camera feed, to the batter who wants to know what pitch to prepare for.
- tacon 7y agoIf the Astros were using the standard public TV camera view, why can't there be some real time image analysis that blurs the signs? If we can instantly recognize millions of faces, it seems pretty simple to blur a catcher's hands when making a sign.
- lukeholder 7y agoThey had their own CCTV camera with a good zoom up in their own stadium, above the broadcast cameras. They only had the advantage on their home field.
- interestica 7y agoThere's no way they were using the TV feed - there'd be too much lag to be useful. The 'bangs' were just way too fast. They might have been using a feed destined for broadcast... Adding blur between camera and broadcast just adds a layer of complexity. Nothing stops the team from installing their own camera. The league shouldn't have to add technology censors to prevent a team from cheating.
- b06tmm 7y agoI don't see this as an issue, unless expressively forbidden. The goal is to win, by all means necessary. Like war. I'm almost 60 now, but in my twenties I thought "why don't teams have people in the stands to do just this, steal the signs." I was a phreaker back then and always wanted to call the Twins dugout just to see if I could.
- astura 7y agoStealing signs using a cameras/video/technology is forbidden. Four people have already lost their jobs over this, additionally, Astros were fined $5 million and lost four draft picks.
- danso 7y agoSports is explicitly not like war. There's actual rulebooks, and regulators with the power to completely ban teams and players.
- hncommenter13 7y agoI think the HN baseball fan crowd is the perfect audience for this paper, entitled "A Mathematical Analysis of Catcher/Pitcher Encryption Schemes." https://courses.csail.mit.edu/6.857/2018/project/mlancast-samird-mtwu-Baseball.pdf https://courses.csail.mit.edu/6.857/2018/project/mlancast-sa...
- remarkEon 7y agoThanks, sharing this with my fantasy league.
- S_A_P 7y agoA few questions: 1) at best this happens at~50% of the games. The Astros won the series in LA that year. Did they find a way to cheat everywhere? 2) what is the end game here? The Astros have won exactly 1 World Series. Hardly a huge disparity. 3) do you think they’re the only team??? 4) what rules were broken? 5) is it wrong for a base runner to scream change-up if they are on 2nd base? Disclaimer: I’m from Houston and of course I want the Astros to win but I don’t think a huge advantage was had here. One could easily get just as outraged by the Yankees having a bottomless bank account to pay their salaries. They Yankees paid 218mm vs 168mm for the Astros. Both teams are on the larger end of the spectrum but I would argue that smaller markets have a huge disadvantage vs the major cities. I’m disappointed that the Astros lost this year but I don’t feel compelled to find a reason the Nationals beat us this year. At the end of the day our pitchers failed(ahem Verlander) and our batters couldn’t hit the superior pitchers in dc. Ironically the “cheaters” couldn’t cheat their way to a second victory. This seems like another case of Twitter and social media amplifying things that don’t matter.
- dlbucci 7y agoSign stealing is a part of baseball since forever (i.e. with a runner on second, like you mentioned). That's not the problem with what Houston did. They used a camera in the outfield to steal the signs, which is against the rules. They are the only team where there is evidence this happened and they only did it the year they won the World Series, so yeah, that seems like it made a difference. As a Pirates fan, I feel you about the salary issue, but everyone is playing by the same rules, so it's not cheating for a team to spend more. It's a pretty orthogonal issue.
- mgoblu3 7y agoFor 5, usually a pitcher and catcher will through multiple signs with a runner on second to scramble the signal, and usually you don’t get enough pitches in to determine which sign is real. With the aid of a camera, the Astros were getting these signals very quickly even though teams were suspicious and using “runner on second” signs against them often.
- sintaxi 7y ago> 1) at best this happens at~50% of the games. That is an assumption. We don't know all the facts yet. Some are suggesting the camera could have been nothing more than a smartphone and there is a source from within the Astros org that say some of the players wore electronic buzzers under their shoulder to signal the call to them. There is no reason to rule out signals were known on the road as well. > 2) what is the end game here? Stop cheaters from winning titles and saving the sport from ruin like cheating did to the sport of boxing. > 3) do you think they’re the only team? Probably not but both existing and former Astros speaking up tells us Astros were doing it at an unprecedented level. > 4) what rules were broken? First of all sign stealing using technology goes all the way back to 1876. Illegal sign stealing involves mechanical or electronic technology; the rules regarding this have become more stringent over time and continue to evolve. This is also why an 8 second delay was added to the broadcast feed. > 5) is it wrong for a base runner to scream change-up if they are on 2nd base? Screaming anything while the opposing pitcher is about to throw I suspect is against the rules but stealing and signalling the signs in other ways is permitted. This is typically done by the base runner using closed fist or open hands. > I don’t think a huge advantage was had here. The Astros obviously thought it was enough of an advantage to break the rules to do it. The Astros went from dead last in the AL in strikeout rate in 2016 to 1st in '17 and their strikeout to walk ratio was an extreme outlier compared to the rest of the league. > Ironically the “cheaters” couldn’t cheat their way to a second victory. Ironic how? Teams were onto them by then. Once you know your opponent is stealing your signs you can use that against them.
- _31 7y agoAs a long time baseball fan, the "punishment" is a joke. This is one of the worst cheating scandals in baseball history and Rob Manfred (Commissioner of MLB) basically gave a slap on the wrist. Every team/player in the league would be willing to trade this "punishment" for a World Series title.
- netwanderer3 7y agoThey really should have stripped away Astro's championship title, not sure what their justification was. Why would the Astros want to keep this championship title in their cabinet anyway? To remind themselves and their fans of what their team did that year?