Signs, Steal, Deliver: Unearthing the 2017 Houston Astros Cheating Scandal
The following article was featured in the March 2020 edition of The Campus.
By Eric Bilach
What comprises a championship Major League Baseball team? An elite pitching rotation? A lineup of sluggers that can rack up runs with a few swings of the bat? An intelligent field manager and business savvy general manager? A passionate, devoted fan base?
The Houston Astros seemingly possessed all of these winning elements en route to their first World Series title back in 2017. After a decade of floundering, the Astros’ luck began to trend upward during the 2015 season. Even in defeat to eventual Word Series champions, the Kansas City Royals, in the 2015 AL Division Series, the Astros solidified themselves as a force to be reckoned with for years to come.
By 2017, the Astros found themselves armed with an explosive, homegrown batting order (including 2015 Rookie of the Year Carlos Correa and 2017 Most Valuable Player José Altuve), a lights-out pitching staff (including Cy Young Award winners Dallas Keuchel and Justin Verlander), and one of the most analytical baseball minds in recent memory (manager A. J. Hinch).
After finishing the 2017 campaign with a record of 101-61 -- leading their division by a staggering 21 games -- the Astros went on to win a pair of seven-game series in the playoffs against the New York Yankees and NL champions, the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Mere months after Hurricane Harvey ravaged much of southeast Texas, the city of Houston was bestowed with its first World Series title in history. Amidst all the carnage of Harvey in August 2017, the Astros shone like beacons of heroic composure on their way to victory.
Despite the Astros’ triumphant win, revelations that have surfaced in recent months regarding the “secret” to the team’s success in 2017 feel like a massive punch to the proverbial gut for the vast majority of MLB fans. In a tell-all interview with The Athletic in November 2019, former Astros pitcher Mike Fiers revealed that the team used a video camera set up in center field to steal opposing teams’ signs while playing at home in Minute Maid Park.
Sign stealing, the practice of observing, decoding, and relaying non-verbal gestures (signs) given by opposing catchers to pitchers, has been a routine practice throughout MLB history. While perfectly legal under normal circumstances, MLB strictly prohibits the use of electronic equipment to steal signs.
The Astros’ complicated and convoluted sign-stealing operation (referred to as the “dark arts” by members of the front office) transpired as follows:
- Live feed of opposing catchers and pitchers was captured by a center-field camera, then transferred to monitors located in the tunnel connected to the Astros’ dugout in Minute Maid Park.
- A member of the Astros organization (usually a staff person) analyzed and deciphered the signs being used by opposing teams via the monitors.
- The team member in the tunnel banged on a trash can a specific number of times to communicate to the Astros player at bat which pitch was likely to be thrown next by the opposing pitcher.
The advantage this strategy granted the Astros was practically insurmountable for any opposing team. As of this issue of The Campus, it is uncertain which Astros players directly participated and benefited from the scheme, or which ones were even aware of the operation’s existence to begin with. What is known is that likely as a result of the center-field camera, the Astros transformed into an offensive juggernaut between their 2016 and 2017 campaigns (see table below) while retaining most of their core roster during the offseason.
Batting Stat Category
2016 Astros
2017 Astros
Batting average (AVG)
.247 (24th in MLB)
.282 (1st in MLB)
On-base percentage (OBP)
.319 (T-18th in MLB)
.346 (1st in MLB)
Slugging percentage (SLG)
.417 (T-15th in MLB)
.478 (1st in MLB)
Home runs (HR)
198 (14th in MLB)
238 (2nd in MLB)
Runs scored (R)
724 (15th in MLB)
896 (1st in MLB)
In speaking with City College senior Sadaab Rahman, Rahman revealed that the punishments levied by the MLB against the Astros organization are, especially when considering the gravity of the scandal, more or less “lenient.” Rahman said:
Losing four future top draft picks in the next two drafts seems like a blow to the Astros’ future, but it really wouldn’t be…I’m pretty sure if you polled all 29 other teams, they would say they’d happily give up picks if it meant they had a championship. The $5 million fine is the most that can be enacted on a team and is a complete slap on the wrist…the team is worth $1.7 billion.
When discussing with Rahman the potential positive outcomes of this scandal -- perhaps a boost in viewership similar to MLB’s infamous “steroid era” during the 1990s -- he noted:
This is a permanent black mark on baseball… Those who watch with love and interest will feel conflicted thinking about whether what we see is real and the results legitimate… Once the Mitchell Report [a written investigation published in 2017 about the use of anabolic steroids and human growth hormone in the MLB] came out is when I would say America and the media started losing interest in baseball…When people start sensing that the product is tainted with juiced balls, it’s not good.
