January 03, 2007
Juicing the Ball
A company that specializes in imaging claims that 1998 balls were juiced, including the ball McGwire hit for home run #70.
"Examining the CT images of Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball one can clearly see the synthetic ring around the core - or 'pill' - of the baseball," UMS president David Zavagno said. "While Mark McGwire may or may not have used illegal steroids, the evidence shows his ball - under the governing body of the league - was juiced."
But Bob DuPuy, baseball's chief operating officer, said the core of the ball has been unchanged for decades. Rawlings has been the exclusive supplier of baseballs to the major leagues since 1977.
"All of our balls are subject to rigorous quality control standards and testing conducted by Rawlings," DuPuy said. "No changes have been made to the core of the ball through the entire time they have manufactured it."
Universal Medical Systems make veterinary scanners. If they have comparative pictures of 1998 and other baseballs, they should post them on the web so everyone can see.
Update: John Costello sent me an e-mail about this earlier today but it got dumped in my junk mail folder. He sends a link with images. However, there are no non-1998 balls for comparison.
Posted by David Pinto at
09:36 PM
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I've got a 1998 National League baseball off the bat of Brant Brown; anyone want to verify the findings?
(By the way, it certainly does say "Cushioned Cork Center.")
But even a batch of identically manufactured balls may not have the same level of liveliness. They will average the same but some will be more lively, some less. If they're just testing home run balls, they are going to be sampling those that are a little livelier than average.
Whether or not the balls were juiced for McGwire (which wouldn't have been cheating since he was not in control of what balls were put in the game), he still is avoiding the question about Steroids. He's straight forward about other things when asked, so why would an innocent person play the avoidance game about a question so important? That really raises my eyebrows. I hate to say that, but that's how he's come across to me.
If he were to say that he didn't take Steriods, I'd believe him and not judge him according to what balls were pitched to him. Until he clears himself, there's more than a shadow of a doubt in my mind. Ironically, that doubt was completely created by McGwire himself.
I don't know about "completely created by McGwire himself," since it's not like McGwire organized the congressional hearing and volunteered to testify. It's painfully obvious that he took steroids, but I understand his rationale for not admitting it (I too would not want to face potential jail time).
If you look at offensive levels since 1993 or 1994, the number of runs per game really takes off, especially if you look at it at baseline ratio level. Major League Baseball hid steroids from us, and expect that they are hiding this change to the baseball from us, too.
And to think people were in such an uproar over the new NBA ball...
Does anyone know who commissioned UMS to conduct this study and why? Could be totally legit, but the story seems a little "off" to me...
