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99% Invisible

418- Sign Stealing

99% Invisible

SiriusXM Podcasts and Roman Mars

Design, Arts

4.827.5K Ratings

🗓️ 20 October 2020

⏱️ 28 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The Houston Astros and the long storied history of sign stealing in baseball

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

This is 99% infasible. I'm Roman Mars.

0:07.8

For a lot of people being a professional baseball player sounds like a total dream job.

0:12.3

I mean, you get paid millions of dollars to play a game, but there are downsides.

0:19.0

Like if you have a bad night at work as a baseball player, it's usually in front of 40,000 screaming fans.

0:26.2

This story is about one of those nights in Houston, Texas.

0:29.4

The Toronto Blue Jays were losing to the hometown Astros when they called in pitcher Mike Bulsinger.

0:35.2

That's baseball reporter Ben Ryder. He covered the game for 15 years as a writer at Sports Illustrated.

0:41.8

Some major league baseball players have job security and 20 million dollar salaries.

0:46.5

They're paid huge bonuses just for getting drafted and their teams have spent years developing them.

0:52.4

Then there are guys like Bulsinger.

0:54.4

I signed for a thousand dollars with a billion dollar organization, so a thousand dollars.

1:00.8

I think it was $667 after taxes.

1:04.6

They don't have that much invested in you.

1:06.7

You make jokes about it. It's like a bucket of baseballs for them.

1:11.0

The night Bulsinger came in, he was facing a stacked Astros lineup.

1:15.1

It's star players like Alex Brugman and Carlos Beltrann.

1:18.9

They were a total juggernaut.

1:20.9

Oh, yeah.

1:21.9

I mean, they were unbelievable from what you see.

1:27.6

The runs they're putting up in my head.

1:31.2

I was like, this is the best team of baseball.

1:34.7

Bulsinger came into the game with a man on first in two outs.

...

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