Toronto Blue Jays ace Chris Bassitt is reigniting the Aaron Judge debate well after their series with the New York Yankees. Controversy surrounded Judge and his team as Domingo German was ejected for sticky substances and Judge was seen appearing to receive signals from his dugout before mashing a home run.
The pitcher who gave up the bomb admitted he was tipping his pitches and many believe the Yankees dugout was helping Judge learn that. He claimed that he was looking at his dugout to silence their yelling at the umpires after manager Aaron Boone was ejected.
Bassitt was recently asked about all of this.
"We knew it was going on. I'll say this about the whole situation. They knew we were tipping and they were relaying tips. Is that illegal? No, it's not illegal.
"Is it kind of in that gray area of like, all right, if the first base and third base coach are having to relay tips, is that kind of a gray area where it's like, should that be allowed for first and third base coaches to do? You can argue that back and forth all you want."
He continued, addressing the slugger's comments after the incident:
"Judge's response to it? I had no problem with it. Was it a lie? Yeah, it was a lie. What do you want him to do, come out and say, 'Hey, all their pitchers were tipping and I'm going to tell them how they're tipping.' I just think he kind of made up a story just to basically kind of say, 'I'm not going to tell them I'm tipping.'"
Bassitt appears to believe that the Yankees were using tactics that weren't illegal to gain an advantage, which certainly isn't uncommon. He also doesn't blame Judge for taking advantage or for lying about it afterward.
Chris Bassitt doesn't believe Aaron Judge did anything wrong
Chris Bassitt declined to speak on whether or not the positioning of the Yankees coaches was wrong, though his team took the issue to the league. He also refused to call Aaron Judge anything unsavory, even going so far as to say he totally understood why the Yankees star wouldn't tell the media the truth.