The maestro was listening to The Best Show Ever? on Monday afternoon and informed us of this interesting nugget from Jayson Stark. This is in response to allegations that Framber Valdez is a disgraceful Astros cheat:

“There hasn’t been a single instance of Major League Baseball enforcing anything, catching anyone. And because of that, you shouldn’t think whatever’s going on, it’s just the Astros… I think most teams know their guys are doing it too. I’m really interested to see if there’s some kind of crackdown after the season, but I don’t think that Framber Valdez was doing anything in that game that every other pitcher in the postseason isn’t doing.”

Spin rates are up. Suspicions are high. Yet the previously hot topic of “sticky stuff” barely even registers in the back half of 2022. Then you’ve got Jayson Stark just casually dropping this on the radio like it’s no big deal.

And maybe it’s not. If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying, as you say. Still, it’s curious to hear a big baseball guy just sort of throw this into a radio interview like it’s afterthought. It’s not like me or Pagan dropping this. It’s a respected national guy.

Anyway, make of that what you will.