Trevor Bauer Has Ball Removed From Game, Defends Himself Against Allegations
It took umpires just one inning to become suspicious about a ball used by Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer during Wednesday's 4-3 loss to the Athletics.
As relayed by NBC Sports Bay Area, umpires removed the ball for the purpose of inspection. The news was first mentioned by A’s radio voice Vince Cotroneo.
Bauer was the prize pitcher in free agency and has been one of MLB's most outspoken players recently. He has publicly challenged commissioner Rob Manfred repeatedly over the years.
Wednesday's move came less than a month after the league released a memo to remind everyone of banned substances on baseballs.
A day later, Bauer more or less ripped the memo.
"It’s only illegal for pitchers to have ‘foreign substance’ on their person, their body or whatever,” Bauer said in a YouTube Video. “It’s not illegal for a catcher or his chest protector, as you’ve seen. It’s not illegal for a third baseman to have it on his glove or a center fielder to have it on his glove -- so far as I know, maybe there’s a rule change or some language -- as far as I know the rules of baseball, it is legal for those guys to have stuff on their glove.
“My question is, if I throw a pitch and it gets thrown out and then gets tested and has a foreign substance on it, how do they know it came from me and not from the catcher’s glove or the third baseman’s glove? Or on a foul ball, what if it happened to hit the handle of a bat where a hitter has pine tar or whatever other substance he wants, which is completely legal so long as it doesn’t too far up the bat?”
It's still too early to say what will come of this. But Bauer's constant bickering with the league office isn't likely to help him.
“They’re going to, after the game, be able to go back and if you tested positive -- or if your baseball tested positive for a foreign substance -- they’re going to be able to suspend you or discipline you or whatever the case may be,” Bauer said in the video. “I have a problem with that.”