The phrase 'foreign substance' has been thrown around a lot recently, as the debate over pitchers altering baseballs to get a better grip has exploded around Major League Baseball. St. Louis Cardinals manager Mike Shildt really let the cat out of the bag, calling the use of foreign substances, "baseball's dirty little secret," and then claiming the league doesn't want to do anything to stop it. Batters and pitchers have also commented, but the response has been split. Is it cheating? Or, like Mets 1B Pete Alonso said, is it good that pitchers have more control considering how hard they throw? There's also a faction that say pitchers have been altering baseballs for decades, why make a fuss now?
On Friday, former Oriole pitcher Dave Johnson joined the Big Bad Morning Show to share his thoughts on the 'foreign substance' debate. Dave pitched in the late 80 and into the early 90's, during a time when pitchers didn't have an arsenal of 'foreign substances'. Dave argues that in today's game, pitchers have a much larger breath of substances at their disposal. Even when his son Steve pitched for the O's in the early 2010s, it was generally a mix of rosin and sunscreen. The game seems to have evolved, even over the last five to ten years. Listen in as Ed, Rob, and Jeremy break down baseball's hottest topic with Dave plus, a little Orioles talk as the O's young pitchers begin to make it up to the big leagues.