Did Jon Lester have Vaseline on his glove? MLB says there is nothing conclusive
UPDATE: Cardinals GM John Mozeliak shares his thoughts on Jon Lester’s glove.
The internet is accusing Boston Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester of cheating during his impressive performance in Game 1 of the World Series on Wednesday night. A number of photos and video clips that have been making the rounds appear to show some sort of substance on the inside of Lester’s glove, which many have speculated could be Vaseline or pine tar.
For a video clip of Lester seemingly going to a specific spot on his glove, click here.
An MLB official briefly addressed the accusations on Thursday morning.
“We cannot draw any conclusions from this video,” the official said, according to WEEI.com’s Alex Speier. “There were no complaints from the Cardinals and the umpires never detected anything indicating a foreign substance throughout the game.
The official added that baseballs potentially being doctored is “an issue we always monitor anyway,” but it sounded like there will be no formal investigation since neither the Cardinals nor the umpiring crew raised any concerns about it.
Still, it will be interesting to see if Lester has an explanation for what the spot on his glove was. There’s no arguing that there was some sort of discoloration, and it seems pretty clear that he went to the spot before throwing a pitch late in the game. Did Vaseline cause Yadier Molina and Adam Wainwright to let a routine popup fall between them or the Cardinals’ infielders to blow a routine ground ball? No, it did not.
