The Padres are entering the 2022 MLB playoffs as a wild-card team, but they have lofty ambitions.
After trading for Juan Soto, Josh Bell, Brandon Drury and Josh Hader at the deadline, the message was clear: team president A.J. Preller believed this was their year and he’d do whatever it took to bring a World Series to San Diego.
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Right-handed starter Joe Musgrove, who won a World Series with the Astros in 2017, is hoping Preller was correct. He has extra motivation to win it all again this year.
“I still don’t feel great about wearing that ring around or telling people that I was a World Series champion on [that Astros team],” Musgrove said, per The Associated Press. “I want one that feels earned and that was a true championship. So that’s the goal.”
What was the 2017 Astros cheating scandal about?
Those are strong words from Musgrove, although much of the baseball world seems to feel the same way.
The Astros were guilty of cheating en route to winning that World Series. They illegally stole catchers’ signs to give batters an advantage. A system was put in place to alert batters what pitch was coming: one bang on a trash can positioned just outside the dugout for a changeup, two bangs for a breaking ball, and none for a fastball.
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The team also disregarded MLB rules by using technology, namely a camera in the outfield and a closed circuit feed, to steal the signs. It employed codebreakers to decipher catchers’ hand signals.
Pitcher Mike Fiers, who was on the team that year and later left as a free agent, blew the whistle by laying out the cheating to The Athletic after the 2019 season.
What was the Astros’ punishment?
Another sore spot for MLB fans was the lack of penalties handed down by MLB commissioner Rob Manfred in early 2020.
Players weren’t sanctioned as part of an agreement to ensure their cooperation in MLB’s investigation, but manager A.J. Hinch and general manager Jeff Luhnow were suspended for the 2020 season. Red Sox manager Alex Cora, who was Hinch’s bench coach in 2017, was also suspended for the year, and the Mets fired Carlos Beltran as their manager. Beltran was a player on the 2017 Astros and was one of the leaders of the scheme.
The Astros were also fined $5 million and docked draft picks in 2020 and 2021.
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Players from the 2017 team are still booed on the road, including former Astros such as George Springer and Carlos Correa. Yankees and Dodgers fans feel particularly aggrieved as the Astros beat those teams in the ALCS and World Series, respectively.
It’s easy to forget Musgrove was a member of the team. He was part of a 10-player trade that sent him from Toronto to Houston in 2016. Musgrove pitched in seven games in the 2017 postseason, totaling 6 2/3 innings. He had an ERA of 8.10 and a FIP of 8.56.
In January 2018, he was sent to the Pirates as part of the trade that brought ace Gerrit Cole to Houston. From Pittsburgh, he went to the hometown Padres in another trade in 2021.
His role with the Padres is very different: he’s the probable starter in a potential deciding Game 3 in this weekend’s Wild Card Series with the Mets.
Astros fans may bristle at Musgrove’s comments, but such are the perils of being involved in scandal. The Astros have a real shot at winning the World Series this year. But 2017 will be scrutinized by baseball historians for as long as baseball exists. Just ask the home run hitters of the 1990s and the early 2000s.