Framber Valdez threw a gem to lead the Houston Astros to a win over the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 2 of the World Series on Saturday night, but some of his actions while on the mound led to another round of cheating suspicions. One Hall of Fame pitcher feels there was nothing to see on that front.
Valdez allowed just one run over 6.1 innings while striking out nine in Houston’s 5-2 victory. One video that went viral from the game showed him repeatedly rubbing a lower part of his palm. It also looked like Valdez wiped something on his pants before a substance check.
Martinez shared some of his thoughts on the topic during the MLB Network postgame show. The three-time Cy Young Award winner demonstrated how using rosin and rubbing it on your skin repeatedly is a good way to legally improve your grip. Martinez said Valdez was likely using rosin and sweat to get a better grip on the baseball.
“You can use the rosin bag and burn it (with friction) on your skin and actually rub a little bit of stickiness,” Martinez said in a video that was shared by a Reddit user. “When you burn it and continue to burn it, later on you’re gonna see that the rosin starts thickening.”
Valdez was asked after Game 2 about the way he was rubbing his palm, and he insisted he was doing nothing illegal.
The Astros are never going to get the benefit of the doubt due to their history of cheating, but it would be incredibly bold of them to try anything like that now. Martinez did not think there was anything Valdez did that was out of the ordinary for a pitcher.
