Phillies reliever remains upset at Astros for sign-stealing scandal

David Robertson of the Philadelphia Phillies was asked about the Houston Astros sign-stealing scandal before the World Series, and he’s still upset about it.

In 2017, David Robertson was a New York Yankee — a team which the Astros defeated and promptly cheated against on their way to a World Series crown. So, it’s easy to understand why he might be upset, and in this case looking for revenge.

“I think that those people who were involved in that situation still, every day, at some point, have to realize what they did and live with the decisions they made,” Robertson said Thursday per the Los Angeles Times. “I will never get 2017 back.”

Robertson’s emergence in the Phils bullpen has been a major storyline in the latter half of the 2022 season. He, along with Seranthony Dominguez and Jose Alvarado, made up a formidable back-end trio for Philadelphia.

Phillies reliever David Robertson hasn’t forgiven the Astros

Houston received their punishment for said scandal, but the players were given a free pass for their cooperation in the investigation by MLB. That’s why, in the eyes of many, the ends didn’t justify the means in every sense.

“I don’t know if it’s just a thing where people get to feel a free pass to yell and to boo and to act like that,” Astros pitcher Lance McCullers said. “It doesn’t matter to us, I don’t think. I think a lot of great teams over history, a lot of great players over history, get booed wherever they go, even if they don’t deserve it. Maybe it’s a weird form of admiration.”

Houston has very little choice but to embrace it at this stage. McCullers is one of only five remaining Astros who were on that 2017 team.

As for Robertson, this isn’t the first time he’s spoken out against that 2017 Astros team. In spring of 2020, he made his thoughts very clear on the matter:

“I got roughed up in Game 6,” Robertson said, per NBC Sports Philadelphia. “And I felt like in that game I threw as well as I’ve ever thrown in my entire life. I had some pitches that got hit that I was a little shocked by and some pitches that didn’t get swung at that I was a little shocked by. At the time, I wasn’t thinking about what we know now. But it all comes together now and, you know, I’m upset about it, that’s for sure…Like I said, I’m still upset about it.”

In some ways, it’s a feud that will never die, especially for those directly impacted by Houston’s wrongdoings.