Major League Baseball has brought sticky substances to the forefront of the 2021 season within a matter of weeks, cracking down on what has long been a gray area in the game.
Earlier in the decade, the debate was around pine tar, with Michael Pineda being ejected from a game for having some of the substance on his neck in a start against the Red Sox. Now, the substance of the day is Spider Tack, designed to help bobybuilders grip large boulders, but baseball has found it to help skyrocket spin rate and increase productivity.
Eno Sarris of The Athletic did a deep dive on the substance in a recent report, and joined Moose & Maggie on Wednesday to discuss what has become an epidemic in the league, most recently leading to scrutiny of Gerrit Cole when he danced around a direct question on if he had ever used Spider Tack in his career.
“Spider Tack gives you 300-500 rpm,” Sarris said. “It increases your breaking ball, it makes breaking balls 30 percent better. I don’t know exactly how many people are using Spider Tack versus other substances. I would say most people are using something, and the question is how many people are using this crazy substance.”
While many have seen substances like pine tar, rosin and sunscreen as acceptable aids to increase the quality of a pitcher’s grip on the ball, Spider Tack is a newer introduction into the sport that many feel have crossed the line. Trevor Bauer went public about his anger of sticky substances, and has since seen his fastball spin rate increase dramatically, from 2,410 in 2019 to 2,779 rpm last season, when he won the Cy Young. Josh Donaldson recently called out Gerrit Cole, who like Bauer, has seen a downtick in spin rate since news broke of the league planning to increase inspections of pitchers for sticky substances.
“It’s around, it’s pervasive, some teams way more than others,” Sarris said. “I think Spider Tack is a little bit like sign stealing, where some organizations are doing it organizationally, telling their minor leaguers to do it, giving them the stuff, and some organizations are not boosting the use as much and their pitchers are not using Spider Tack as much as a little pine tar or sunscreen.”
Cole saw his fastball spin rate surge from 2,164 rpm in 2017 to 2,530 by 2019, which many attributed to being introduced to a new way to increase spin rate once he joined the Astros, who obviously have a scarlet letter when it comes to cheating in baseball. But Sarris wouldn’t point to Houston when looking at the driving force behind Cole’s ascent.
“I couldn’t find a team-wide phenomenon,” Sarris said. “I could say yes, Gerrit Cole’s spin rate really increased when he got to Houston, and that Bauer and Driveline and other places have tried to show you can maybe increase your spin rate mechanically on the order of 50-100 rpm, but these other substances are 200, 300, 400 rpm, and that’s what you saw with Gerrit Cole, was like a 200-300 rpm boost when he got to Houston. So that’s why he was so awkward on the Zoom. I think it’s fair to say he started using something there, but I don’t think you can blame the whole organization. [Justin] Verlander’s spin rates were very high before he got there…[Charlie] Morton’s spin rates went up in Philadelphia when he started throwing harder.”
So, how did certain organizations come to use substances like Spider Tack as a way to boost pitching efficiency and likely aid in historic strikeout rates that are now the results of nearly 25 percent of all at-bats? Sarris points to technology in baseball, which has given pitchers tangible data on what improves their performance on the mound.
“What I point to is the rise of the machines,” Sarris said. “The machines became sentient. What happened was, everyone started throwing in front of Rapsodo, Trackman, Edgertronic video. As soon as they started throwing in front of those in every bullpen in every spring training, in every lab in the offseason, then it’s super easy. Then you’re like ‘that thing measures every spin rate I ever do and tells me how much movement I have. Oh look, the last pitcher left some goop out, let me just put some on. Oh my god, I just got 200 rpm, yeah I’m using this!’ So I think some part of it has to do with the machines that are now a part of every bullpen.”
Now, the league is looking to combat that surge by getting spin rates back to more mortal-like numbers, and hopefully bringing back some more offense into the game. Many eyes will be on Cole Wednesday night as he takes the mound for the first time since fumbling through Tuesday’s Zoom, and his first start since getting tagged by the Rays and posting a curiously low spin rate. That decrease in spin rate may already be a response to the league’s new initiative to calm down a movement that is apparently rampant within clubhouses across the league.
But as the league closes its fist on the issue, things could get ugly.
“You’ve seen some fairly high-profile pitchers’ spin rates go down just by announcing this,” Sarris said. “Maybe they’re hoping that by roasting a couple guys and announcing this big thing that they kind of quiet down the use across the sport. I don’t know. What it took in steroids was an actual testing policy, a big change in baseball and some hard moments.”
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