The teams that win a lot are always the bad guys. I think 2016 was the last year we were the good guys.
When we won it in 2017 we were a feel good story. Coming out of Harvey we were a symbol of resilience. Correa proposing on the field tugged at heartstrings and Altuve was a can do everyman who didn’t let his lack of height keep him down. Even in 2019 while the storyline was the plucky Nationals we weren’t hated. All of that changed and by the 2020 season we were firmly cemented as the villains of baseball. Steven A. Smith called Altuve a villain and many people in media made him the face of all that was wrong in baseball.
Wrong thread for this, I know, but: I do not watch talking heads talk and yell, at all. I still watch some of College Gameday on espn I like some of MLB Network's studio stuff I like some of CBS/Fox NFL pregame. Is there anything else worthwhile?
This is what many of my "friends in Minnesota" want to do to me. Even my cat who's lived her whole life in Minnesota puked in my shoes last nigh.
This from the Fort Worth Star Telegram. And of course they say we were cheating in 2018 and 19 also https://www.star-telegram.com/sport...Map5Sr2H7kaSQ8Jz7LicNelQo_ZDg&mibextid=Zxz2cZ You don’t want to hear this but the Houston Astros are a Godsend to baseball The Astros’ hiring the nicest man in the history of professional sports to be their manager cannot save them from the reality that everyone outside the city of Houston hates their existence. Houstonians, no amount of man ‘splaining, lobbying or begging will convince anyone outside of Harris County that your beloved Astros did anything other than cheat their way to a dynasty. Now that Bill Belichick’s New England Patriots are NFL-chum without Tom Brady, the Houston Astros are The Team That Americans Love to Hate. No one at Major League Baseball would dare admit this publicly, but the Astros are a gift to their marketing team. The Houston Astros have replaced the New York Yankees as the real Evil Empire. Without the Astros continually advancing in baseball’s postseason, there is no team in sports right now with the fangs like this team. Nothing moves the needle like the organic unification between strangers to watch the bad guy get his. Starting Sunday night in Houston for Game 1 of the American League Championship Series, the Texas Rangers will play the Astros for the the Texas State title. Nearly all of America will be Rangers fans, hoping that Houston just doesn’t win another World Series. Make no mistake, through a series of shrewd moves and personnel decisions, the Astros are currently sports’ most dominant dynasty. Seven consecutive ALCS championships, four World Series appearances and two titles is a dynasty by the most conservative of definitions. How they built some, not all, of this dynasty is through cheating. Make no mistake, Astros fans, your favorite team got away with it. When PBS’s Frontline dedicates a 1 hour, and 24-minute episode to your team, something has gone terribly wrong. (BTW: Frontline’s “The Astros’ Edge,” which aired on Oct. 3, is worth your time). What the Astros did makes Tom Brady’s “Deflategate” nonsense look like parking illegally in an empty mall lot. In 2017, ‘18 and ‘19, the Astros used technology, and a garbage can, to help an already loaded roster win a World Series and reach the next two postseasons. To guarantee honesty from the players, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred agreed before the investigation there would be no punishments, for the players. All records and achievements would remain intact. The consequences are both minimal, and eternal. GM Jeff Luhnow and manager A.J. Hinch were suspended for a year, the team was fined $5 million and docked their first and second-round draft picks in 2020 and 2021. Both men were fired by the Astros. After MLB handed down that punishment, L.A. Dodgers outfielder Cody Bellinger said, “I think what people don’t realize is (Astros second baseman Jose) Altuve stole an M.V.P. from (Yankees outfielder Aaron) Judge in ’17. “Everyone knows they stole the ring from us.” The Astros defeated the Dodgers to win the 2017 World Series. Current Texas Rangers shortstop Corey Seager was a member of that Dodgers lineup, and had the last at bat of Game 7, a routine grounder to second. At least two other clubs were thought to be doing what the Astros did in this time frame, but the hammer never hit any team other than the Astros. What the Astros did is never going away, especially since so many of the players from those teams are still around. The Astros were/are a loaded team and built through a long series of savvy, pioneering decisions. It was proven they cheated for a period during what is now a seven-year run. The first is to be celebrated, while the second will be forever criticized. “There is always other parts (to the story). Tom Brady and Deflategate,” Luhnow told Ben Reiter during the Frontline interview, during which Luhnow maintains he knew nothing of the cheating scheme. “There is always something. I’m not trying to minimize it. It’s there, and we all face the music. But the Astros are one of the best sports teams of the 21st century. Period.” Read more at: https://www.star-telegram.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/mac-engel/article280444579.html#storylink=cpy
It really really sucks that Altuve is the face of a cheating scandal considering there’s heavy evidence that he didn’t even participate and certainly wasn’t the ringleader. But until Altuve retires the Astros are going to have to deal with the cheater label being the primary thing people talk about.
Yes the Frontline documentary specifically disproves that Altuve was using trash and or buzzers. The narrative is so firmly ingrained that the Stros were cheating and Altuve was the ringleader that most baseball fans and writers, including the guy from the Ft Worth Star Telegram, just go along with it. This was my point t of starting this thread we can’t convince people of the truth when it just easier to blame the Stros. We might as well just embrace being the Bad Guys.
Using Bellinger’s quote, which is speculative BS, without any commentary is a deliberate method to say something the writer knows is incorrect but create deniability because “it’s his opinion, not mine.” And of course ‘18 and ‘19 is just wrong, as he surely knows. Just bush league stuff.
ya know the old saying a lie makes its way around the world before the truth can lace up its boots applies here. These people are too far gone and know EXACTLY what they’re doing. It used to annoy and piss me off but I’ve moved on and see it as comical and willful ignorance. Sad state of affairs for journalism but we already knew that.
Astros Fans seem to react more and care more about all this **** than anybody else. Move on. Let 'em talk and worry about what we're doing but not doing, but maybe we are? But not. You know better. Flags fly forever.
