Get a grip: Pitchers unsure on eve of sticky stuff crackdown

NEW YORK – Gerrit Cole hardly expects a smooth transition when Major League Baseball ups its efforts against sticky substances.

Then again, the Yankees ace – like many around the game – isn’t entirely sure what’s going to happen.

“I don’t have a lot of expectations, to be honest,” Cole said. “I think I’m in the same boat as everyone else, just waiting for this to play out.”

Beginning Monday, pitchers will be ejected and suspended for 10 games if caught using foreign substances to doctor baseballs. Such grip aids – ranging from a tacky mix of rosin and sunscreen to heavy duty concoctions designed for use in strongman competitions – have long been illegal, but the ban has rarely been enforced.

That changes this week. Major and minor league umpires will make regular checks of all pitchers, even if opposing managers don’t request inspections – a shift ordered by the commissioner’s office and shared with teams via memo on Tuesday.

Umpires will check all starters multiple times and all relievers either at the end of his first inning or when removed, whichever occurs first. Caps, gloves and fingertips will be checked. Umps also may check when they notice sticky balls or when they perceive a pitcher going to his glove, cap, belt, uniform or body in a manner that may be to retrieve or apply a substance.

Players suspended for violations will not be replaced on the active roster. Catchers will also be subject to routine inspections and position players may be searched, too.

“I’m curious like everyone of what its going to look like,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “Are we going to have frisking going on, what that whole process is going to look like? Are guys trying to get away with things? Certainly that’ll be part of it.”

The perception is that pitchers have gone wild with sticky stuff in recent seasons as high speed cameras have enabled them to see the way it enhances spin. The league boosted monitoring of baseballs at the start of this season and found enough evidence of wrongdoing to proceed with a midseason adjustment.

The sticking point for pitchers isn’t that MLB wants to crack down – it’s the hastiness of the uptick.

There are several alternatives to a full-blown ban MLB could consider down the road, including tackier baseballs or the approval of a controllable substance for use by all pitchers.

For now, pitchers will be punished for anything and everything, leading to concern about an overcorrection.

The major league batting average was .232 through April, down from .252 two years ago and under the record low of .237 set in 1968.