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Umpires collected the balls, which had "visible
markings and were sticky," per The Athletic. The balls
reportedly were sent to the league office for additional
inspection.
Bauer appeared to respond to the allegation, posting on Twitter,
"Lol always fun reading desperate and misleading clickbait
headlines from national gossip bloggers. To translate fake
journalist speak for y'all, 'It's unclear whether' = 'I can't be
bothered to look into this cuz it doesn't fit my narrative.'"
Pitchers are prohibited from using foreign substances to doctor
baseballs. Such substances can affect a pitcher's grip and the
sharpness of breaking pitches, potentially giving those throwing
the balls an unfair advantage over hitters.
Bauer, 30, signed a three-year, $102 million deal with the
Dodgers during the offseason. He won the National League Cy
Young Award last season with the Cincinnati Reds.
On Wednesday, Bauer limited Athletics hitters to two runs on
three hits in 6 2/3 innings. He walked one and struck out 10,
giving him double-digit strikeouts in each of his first two
starts for Los Angeles.
The league sent a memo to teams March 23 stating that one point
of emphasis this season would be monitoring pitchers and
enforcing rules against using foreign substances on baseballs.
However, even if the baseballs used by Bauer are determined to
have foreign substances, The Athletic reported that it could be
difficult for the league to prove that he was responsible for
doctoring those baseballs.
In 2014, right-hander Michael Pineda drew a 10-game suspension
with the New York Yankees when he was found to have a foreign
substance on his neck during a pitching appearance. That
situation presented a more clear-cut case against the pitcher.
"I don't believe unless you can catch somebody in the act, doing
it in the moment, and you get something on their hand or on
their person, that you can truly prove 100 percent that they are
doing it," an unnamed general manager told The Athletic. "We all
know. But to suspend somebody for 10 games, you've got to have
real evidence."
--Field Level Media
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