The Houston Astros are World Series champions after knocking off the Philadelphia Phillies in their six game series. The Astros, who have made it to the ALCS in six straight seasons, finally won their second title during that stretch, despite making it to the World Series in three of the past five seasons.
This win is particularly important for the Astros, as it proved to the MLB that they are indeed good, and not a product of the sign-stealing scandal that rocked the organization back in 2020. For those needing a quick reminder, the Astros were found to be guilty of using video technology to steal and decode their opponents pitch signals, providing them with a huge leg up on their opponent.
The Astros were heavily penalized for their actions and have been tormented by opposing teams and fans for their actions. And while their latest World Series win doesn't mean their slate should be wiped clean, it shows that the Astros are indeed a good baseball team, and it should eradicate the excuse that Houston simply wins because they cheat.
The Astros latest World Series proves they are not the product of cheating
The Astros sign-stealing scandal was the subject of much attention ahead of the 2020 season, and for good reason. The depth of their cheating was never before seen, and there was proof that it helped them win the 2017 World Series as well. Teams such as the New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers were livid, as they believed they had a World Series title snatched right out from underneath their noses.
In a sense, they are right, but blaming the Astros cheating on their own losses has always been a bit silly. Yes, the Astros cheated and had an unfair advantage, and yes, there is reason to be upset about it. But baseball is a fickle sport; you can hit a ball perfectly and still record an out. That's not the sole reason those teams lost in the 2017 postseason.
The Astros continued to steal signs in the 2018 season, although there was no evidence that they used their system in the 2018 postseason or the 2019 season as a whole. All the Astros did was go to the ALCS in 2018 and back to the World Series in 2019. Then the news of the cheating broke, and chaos broke out throughout the league.
The problem with continually blaming the Astros for cheating is that they just kept on winning. They made it back to the ALCS in 2020 before nearly pulling off an improbable 3-0 rally against the Tampa Bay Rays, and then lost in the World Series in 2021. They were back in the World Series again this season, and finally won for the first time since 2017.
There is simply no more denying it; the Astros are a good baseball team. It raises the question of why they needed to even steal signs in the first place, but that's beyond the point. There simply cannot be any excuses for their winning anymore.
The Astros front office has done an unbelievable job of weathering the fallout from the scandal and building their team back up afterwards. They have lost some big name players such as George Springer and Carlos Correa in free agency in recent seasons, but you wouldn't have noticed based on how they continue to win at such a high rate.
Following up on that, a majority of the players involved in the sign-stealing scandal are no longer with the team. Stars like Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman remain, but they are still producing at an extremely high rate. For the most part, they had proved that the reports of their demise without knowing which pitch was coming were simply inaccurate; winning the World Series is the cherry on top.
You can loathe the Astros franchise for their cheating ways, but we are nearly five years away from when the incidents happened. If the Astros were going to be bad, they would have already fallen off a cliff. They had an advantage they didn't really need to have, and while it definitely helped them win a World Series in 2017, there's a decent chance they would have won it all that season even if they weren't cheating.
Regardless of your feelings of past Astros teams, this team won the World Series fair and square. Unless there's some wild cheating scandal that we haven't found out about (which isn't the case here) the Astros have completed their quest to prove that they aren't a product of their sign-stealing scandal. Houston has a good baseball team, and hate them or love them, there's no longer any way to deny it.
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