Joe Mauer insists he wasn't tipping pitches on Tuesday.But if he could have, he would have.
"As baseball players, you try to get edges any way you can," Mauer said Thursday. "At that point in time it was more of a coincidence thing than anything. I wasn't relaying any signs at that time or anything like that. Obviously, if you can see something, you're going to try to take advantage.
"If I knew what they were throwing, I'd try to let my guy know. There's a lot of teams out there that do that"
More Coverage: Twins Teammates Laugh Off Allegation
These were Mauer's first comments addressing a YouTube video that purported to correlate Mauer's gestures at second base with the pitches thrown by Detroit's Justin Verlander to Minnesota's Jason Kubel.
"It's kind of funny," Mauer said. "It's totally off."
As a catcher himself, Mauer knows that catchers disguise signs -- and that being so blatant about tipping pitches would lead to a beanball or two."It would be a lot less obvious than that," he said. "That's just a habit of mine. My right earflap, or whatever, I always kind of go to that."
As for Justin Morneau's kidding that he's still waiting for Mauer to give him the help he gave Kubel, Mauer said, "Yeah, right. He doesn't need any help."
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
10-02-2009 @ 8:17AM
mailguy2723 said...
If he wants to learn how to steal signals ask the Patriots i,m sure they would be able to help them out
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10-02-2009 @ 8:35AM
dolphin976 said...
Mmmm, I thought this article was about baseball. Silly.
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10-02-2009 @ 9:56AM
mjr15 said...
Not a thing wrong with stealing signs...common place. The catcher doesn't yell out "breaking ball, fast ball..." before the pitch right? Pretty hard to tip pitches though. I played and there is almost too much going on for this to be effective
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10-02-2009 @ 10:46AM
tarponio said...
This is stupid whoever wrote this article. Its a part of baseball!
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10-02-2009 @ 11:10AM
Sgt said...
Wake me up when there is something better to write about!ZZZZZZZZZ
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10-02-2009 @ 11:36AM
papam11 said...
Who cares--there's no such thing as honesty or sportsmanship anymore.
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10-02-2009 @ 12:17PM
tdelcamp said...
That is why there is only one sport with integrity-golf. Baseball players will lie and cheat any way they can. Mauer got a call this week in Detroit by holding out the ball like he had caught it. Replays showed that the ball bounced off a fan and the fence before it got to his glove. Go Tigers!
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10-02-2009 @ 12:43PM
John said...
To the clown who wrote this article...I doubt never played sports. It is part of the game. Good grief. Write about something important for goodness sakes!
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10-02-2009 @ 3:34PM
htcorner23 said...
Sign stealing is part of baseball, and always has been. It's up to each team to see that their signs aren't stolen or that they disguise them well. Go Joe Mauer!
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10-02-2009 @ 3:39PM
hjbraeseke said...
Good Grief what planet do you habitate???????? Stealing bases, signals, whatever is an integral part of every sport invented....... GET REAL
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10-02-2009 @ 6:24PM
wats good negrit said...
I LOVE MAUER
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10-02-2009 @ 6:26PM
wats good negrit said...
HE CAN DO NO WRONG
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10-07-2009 @ 8:39PM
waaaaazuuuuup said...
soooo what...this is boring... you poeple .. why when your team enters the post season after so many years you think you are pro baseball analyst??? you poeple know crap about baseball... you read anything and right away you believe it.. when its an article about one of your teams you deny it..hypocrits....twin fans making comments about teams they havent even beaten yet ... talking ws like they think they going there??? lololol.. twins are an ok team.. talking about other teams spending and that they have a farm system that is better than all others? i dont see it... where are the ws wins? how many times you guys been in the post in the last 20 years? come on ...come back to reality.. your home bread players never get to shine for the twins because your greedy owners sell them to the highest bidders... twins owners only care about making money.. yankees spend 200 million and make it back 10 fold... when you guys win some pennants or ws then you can down talk everone else...
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