Posted by: slider Posted on: Mar 16th, 2004, 3:39pm
That parking garage is a good place from which to steal catchers' signals and relay to the hitter!

Wow-this post sure turned out to be prophetic. After Saturday nights UM-FSU game you really have to wonder if something fishy is going on down at Coral Gables. Weve heard talk of this before about Miami, but never any evidence has been found. So either Mike Martin is being a crybaby(which is possible since that sure would be in character for him) or Miami is very good at cheating. If Miami is guilty-the one thing I dont understand is how are they possbily getting word to the batter in time for the pitch. If he stepped out of the box and looked into the dugout that would be one thing, but its not like they do that before every pitch-How are they doing it and are they doing it???

Maybe they have headsets in their batting helmets.

Seriously, if they are using the parking garage to steal signals, it would seem kind of obvious - I mean someone with binoculars is not all that dificult to spot.
Unless they have some kind of built-in camera with-in the structure an like you said BurrowingOwl the timing it would take time to relay the info to the batters.

Make's you wonder - maybe we'll see this as part of Ripley's believe it or not, some time in the future.

To get the lowdown on sign stealing, go to sebaseball and then florida state forum them to section 1b it's all baseball and you'll get the full story. TV in locker room, someone on walkie talkie calls fastball from centerfield camera shot, key word is used from dugout in time to alert hitter. Martin had his bullpen walkie talkie on and heard Fastball, then heard change up. Those walkie talkies pick up other wts in area. Umps were called together and searched dugout and locker room. Tv was in locker room which is in clear violation of ncaa rules, but umps said they found no weapons of mass destruction. Morris said it's always something with Martin. This from the guy who got his career started at FSU by Martin. Amazing.

Maybe thats it Slider-a keyword is yelled from the dugout to the batter. I would think they would have to change trhe keyword quite often though otherwise it would be quite obvious what they were doing. Ive spent more than a few games in the standing room areabehind home plate at the Light(most recently Miami-FAU in the regionals) and Ive never noticed UM using the keywords, but I will definitely pay closer attention next time.
Assuming someone ever found proof that they were stealing signs the question becomes what is the penalty for stealing signs with the NCAA or is there one? I imagine it would be hard to prove because its basically one teams word over another.
At any rate I hope Coach Cooney and the boys have a good plan to mix up the signs later this year-especially if we get stuck having to see Cokcroft again as has been rumoured.