Stealing signs: fair or foul? Baseball's on-field intelligence gathering has been going on since the early years of the major leagues - decrypting signals given by coaches and managers

Baseball Digest, August, 2002 by Greg Couch

"He had those long fingers," Hundley said. "I looked up, and all of a sudden I noticed that sometimes I'd see those fingers and sometimes I wouldn't."

Eventually, Hundley determined that when Bench called for a curveball, he'd drop his fingers down. On fastballs, Hundley didn't see the fingers.

"I told some of our guys: `I've got his signs. If you hear me before a pitch, it's a breaking ball. If you don't, it's a fastball,'" Hundley said. "I'd yell out something like, `Come on, Davey,' or whatever. We came back and won that game."

Hundley also remembered a game in Montreal in which he thought he heard a loud whistle sound every time the Cubs threw a curveball, "so I looked around, and sure enough their third base coach was doing the whistling."

But those were the old days, according to former player and White Sox broadcaster Jimmy Piersall. He believes sign-stealing isn't happening nearly as much today. He thinks the Cubs have probably not stolen many signs all year.

Piersall credits that to catchers adjusting their positions just as a pitch is being thrown. That, he said, has made sign-stealing much more difficult.

"There just isn't enough time anymore to relay the information," Piersall said. "That's why I don't think Sosa's doing it. But these guys today don't know how to steal signs, anyway. They don't talk on the bench with each other about how a catcher's doing this or a pitcher's doing that.

"We used to do it all the time. Then we'd get caught, and the pitcher would knock us on our ..."

That's the other part of the unwritten rule being broken here. These things are supposed to be self-policed. If a pitcher believes someone is stealing his signs, he can deck the batter. Instead, Morris complained publicly, threatening that he might have to hit someone with a pitch if it continued.

Cubs pitcher Kerry Wood offered the necessary retaliation--also part of the unwritten rules--that if Morris can hit players, so can Wood.

"Why would Morris say that?" Stone asked. "Why would he announce he's going to do it?"

Of course, Wood made an announcement, too.

"Yes," Stone said. "You have to defend your players."

It's all right there in the rules.