Major League Baseball season may have just ended, but Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Alek Manoah is already doing his part to make sure the rivalry with the New York Yankees stays heated into 2023.
Manoah appeared on Milwaukee Bucks center Serge Ibaka’s “How Hungry Are You?” show and was asked by Ibaka who the worst cheater in baseball history is. The pitcher hesitated for a moment before naming New York Yankees pitcher Gerrit Cole.
Alek Manoah says Gerrit Cole is the biggest cheater in baseball history pic.twitter.com/XmQ1XewD4M
— Jomboy Media (@JomboyMedia) November 21, 2022
“He used a lot of sticky stuff to make his pitches better and he kind of got caught on it,” Manoah said.
Manoah may not be totally off the mark here, to be fair. While naming Cole as the biggest cheater in the history of baseball is quite a stretch, the Yankees ace did not exactly deny using illegal substances to improve pitch grip and spin rate. Cole was hardly the only one doing that, though, which is why the league began its foreign substance crackdown in 2021. Plus, the Yankee ace is fresh off a season that saw him post a 3.50 ERA and 257 strikeouts, so it is not as if he completely lost effectiveness once the crackdown began.
Manoah does have a bit of history with Cole, but he may just be trying to spice things up here. It will probably work once New York catches wind of his remarks.
