2014 Sale/Tigers Binoculars Incident Revisited

[Jose Abreu]

I saw a Tigers fan bring this incident up (good summary: Sale/Tigers Incident 2014). It made me realize that we never really did get much information about this. What we know is that Sale and Garcia thought that somebody in CF was tipping signs to Tigers hitters. Sale then hit Victor Martinez, and the benches cleared. Sale made a "binoculars" gesture in the dugout, and Ian Kinsler and the Tigers proceeded to mock that gesture throughout the game.

Even after the game, not much was revealed about the incident. This is from an article published yesterday:

J.D. Martinez didn't immediately know what to think when he got to the American League All-Star team's clubhouse in Cincinnati and saw that his locker neighbor was White Sox pitcher Chris Sale.

 

In all the battles the Tigers have had with Sale and the White Sox, his outsider's impression was that he was kind of a jerk.

 

"Pretty much, though I used another word for it," he said, laughing. "It was cool, though."

 

Turns out, he misjudged Sale completely.

 

"I mean, I was kind of shocked," Martinez said. "We face him all the time, so I always thought he was just like one of those persons you don't really want to talk to. Doesn't look like a very nice person when he's on the mound.

 

"But you're just sitting there and talking him, and he's a nice guy, he's cool."

So I guess my question is, what was really going on that day? I looked at the Soxtalk archives, and even the game thread didn't have much to say about it.

[Kyyle23]

I saw a Tigers fan bring this incident up (good summary: Sale/Tigers Incident 2014). It made me realize that we never really did get much information about this. What we know is that Sale and Garcia thought that somebody in CF was tipping signs to Tigers hitters. Sale then hit Victor Martinez, and the benches cleared. Sale made a "binoculars" gesture in the dugout, and Ian Kinsler and the Tigers proceeded to mock that gesture throughout the game.

Even after the game, not much was revealed about the incident. This is from an article published yesterday:

 

So I guess my question is, what was really going on that day? I looked at the Soxtalk archives, and even the game thread didn't have much to say about it.

 

Victor destroys Chris, and a few times it was intimated that they were stealing signs from the outfield

[Jose Abreu]

Victor destroys Chris, and a few times it was intimated that they were stealing signs from the outfield

I know, but how could they have done that and relayed signs to the hitter? And were they really stealing signs or were Sale and Garcia just being morons

[bighurt574]

I don't know, but once Flowers started setting up inside while Sale pitched outside, V. Martinez was swinging and missing pretty badly. Of course, a lot of hitters do that against Sale.