Errors On and Off the Field

Drellich's latest book, Winning Fixes Everything: How Baseball's Brightest Minds Created Sports' Biggest Mess, details the rise and fall of former Houston Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow, who was suspended, then fired, after Drellich and fellow Athletic writer Ken Rosenthal broke the story of the Astros' cheating during the 2017 and 2018 seasons. Houston used a camera placed in center field to transmit video of pitch signs coming from opposing catchers to their clubhouse. Astros players and staffers would then inform the batter of the next pitch, banging trash cans or—as Drellich explains in one entertaining episode—a massage gun against the clubhouse door. Using the camera itself was not against MLB's rules, but electronic sign stealing was, per a letter baseball commissioner Rob Manfred sent all 30 owners in September 2017.