PitchCom becoming big part of MLB. Will St. Louis Cardinals embrace the new technology?

A new tool that’s been touted by Major League Baseball as an exciting innovation and that’s been widely adopted by nearly half the teams in the big leagues is struggling to catch on in the St. Louis Cardinals clubhouse.

The usage of PitchCom, an electronic system used for signaling pitch selection, was included by MLB among the top headlines for fans to watch in the upcoming season. A signaling device is worn by the catcher, who selects the pitch he wants thrown on a keypad. That information then plays through a receiver in the hat of a pitcher as well as relevant fielders, should they choose to be included in the process.

The Kansas City Royals are among the teams who have adopted PitchCom’s usage. The Cardinals, on the other hand, only have the equipment in their dugout because they were mandated by MLB to make it available.

“It’s not a like or love,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said. “The fact is that it’s necessary. That’s where we are in the game.”

After the sign stealing scandal around the Houston Astros led to year-long suspensions and further accusations around the game — including one against the Boston Red Sox which resulted in a warning and one against the New York Yankees which generated documents the league is fighting in court to keep sealed — both the league and independent entities looked for an inventive way to eliminate the advantage which could be gained by an untoward system of sign acquisition.

Players in the Cardinals clubhouse were skeptical. Catcher Yadier Molina said he’d never tried the system out, and his backup, Andrew Knizner, said he did so only briefly and not in game action.

The Cardinals were shown a brief promotional video explaining the devices and took an informal vote to determine whether the devices should be tried out during spring. The result was a resounding no.

Knizner — as well as others in the clubhouse — expressed a belief some sign stealing is part of the game. If a runner on second base, for instance, is able to successfully read a catcher’s signals in real time and successfully relay them to the hitter, that is generally considered to be fair play and within the bounds of the game.

PitchCom, in that way, could decrease the impact of what had previously been a rare skill.

Some of the clubhouse complaints seemed to result more from a lack of information about the system than from issues with the system itself. One infielder took a hard line against using PitchCom, explaining, “I need to know the (expletive) signs too.”

Concerns about PitchCom

That problem is addressed by the current rules, as are some of the more conspiratorial thoughts shared by some players. Concerns ranged from a suspicion that MLB had been paid to use the system to a thought that perhaps its data could be stored and later accessed unfairly. One pitcher even surmised that it could bring on the risk of opponents listening to pirated radio signals in real time.

John Hankins, one of the co-inventors of PitchCom and an owner of the company, explained that those concerns had been thoroughly addressed with the league office.

“PitchCom did not enter into a sponsorship agreement with MLB of any sort, nor does PitchCom provide any payments to the league,” Hankins said. “PitchCom is only paid for the use of the devices by MLB.”

He added that, “PitchCom does not store any information whatsoever, so there is no data to be analyzed or accessed after real-time usage to evaluate pitch selection.”

Approximately half of MLB’s teams will use PitchCom

MLB estimates 15 of its 30 teams will use PitchCom during the 2020 season, and yet only one Cardinals pitcher approached about the topic seemed open to its usage. Long reliever Jake Woodford said that he saw both the pace of play and security benefits, but Aaron Brooks, at the locker next door, was surprised to hear the system had actually been approved for usage.

Matheny theorized the eager adoption of Royals all-star catcher Salvador Peréz rubbed off on his teammates.

“You have a Gold Glove, Silver Slugger style catcher who says this is really good for us,” Matheny said, “guys tend to follow.”

Molina’s late arrival to spring training may have made integrating the system into the team’s pitching plans slightly more difficult, but the borderline hostility to the technology inside the Cardinals clubhouse suggests that it would’ve been unlikely to be accepted regardless.

Many other teams eager to accept change

In developing his own unique system of signals to the pitchers, Molina is unlikely to fall into the trap his teammates said tripped up many modern catchers — if you consistently use the same, simple system for signals with a runner on second, it hardly takes a camera and a trash can to decode the signs.

Every pitcher asked — including those retired and now working as broadcasters — said it often is trivial to decode a team’s signs given a full day and a full set of video to work from. For the Cardinals, being deceptive is a point of pride.

PitchCom obviates the need for that pride, and many around the game are eager to accept that change. Until they’re forced to do so, it’s clear that those in St. Louis are still willing to push back.

This story was originally published April 13, 2022 at 8:00 AM.