Capitalism Wins Again: Spider Tack Blowing Up After Gerrit Cole, MLB Mentions
A couple weeks back, Yankees ace Gerrit Cole was asked about his use of Spider Tack to increase his spin rate, and he sputtered like Elmer Fudd. He told us without telling us that he was using the substance, and according to Spider Tack's co-inventor James Deffinbaugh, business is booming.
Good for them.
"On that particular day, it would have been about 100 times what I would have done on a typical day a year ago," Deffinbaugh said to Yahoo Sports.
"I started seeing a lot of orders to Major League stadiums. Just, you know, things that are clearly baseball-related. I Googled a couple names, and they were starting professional pitchers."
His pitch to Major League Baseball:
"It would be great if Major League Baseball came out and said, 'Hey, can we do something that's not quite as sticky? For all the pitchers?' That'd be awesome. That'd be a dream," Deffinbaugh concluded.
Pitchers across baseball publicly complained about the dangers of changing the rules mid-season, and that makes sense. Why would baseball change the grip on a baseball in the middle of a season before pitchers have a chance to adjust to it? What happened is that commissioner Rob Manfred panicked after all the no-hitters and made a sudden change to help alleviate a problem instead of letting it correct itself.
At the very least, Spider Tack lives to fight another day. After all, who isn't intrigued by this company? You mean to tell me there's a product we can order that'll help us have a better breaking ball? Sounds like a sweet deal to me.
And as those of you who follow me on Twitter @Garysheffieldjr already know, I challenged Dodgers ace Trevor Bauer that I'd strike him out. He responded swiftly, and now that I know how to get ahold of Spider Tack, I just may use it.
Will Bauer last a second in my batter's box? Not a chance.