FAQ: Explaining Diamondbacks' intentional balk in loss to White Sox

On Saturday night at Chase Field, the Diamondbacks fell 9-2 to the Chicago White Sox. It was one of their worst losses of the year.

All four of their pitchers allowed at least one run. They had 10 opportunities with runners in scoring position but only managed to push across two runs. They allowed four homers to a White Sox team that had not hit that many in a game all year. They lost by seven runs to the worst team in baseball.

While the Diamondbacks will be looking to flush Saturday night and move on, there was one particularly peculiar moment that warrants further investigation.

It came in the top of the third inning, when the Diamondbacks held a 1-0 lead. With White Sox catcher Martin Maldonado at second base and Andrew Vaughn at the plate, Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo emerged from the dugout with a peculiar plan: He wanted D-backs reliever Thyago Vieira to balk intentionally.

What exactly did Torey Lovullo tell Thyago Vieira?

Lovullo’s request to Vieira was simple: “Drop the ball.”

Lovullo knew that if Vieira dropped the ball after coming set, a balk would result. And that would move Maldonado from second base to third base. (Lovullo had his reasons for doing this; more on that in a moment.)

Vieira has only been in the Diamondbacks’ organization for a little over a week. As such, Lovullo wanted to make sure that Vieira was okay with his odd request.

Vieira looked Lovullo in the eye. “Very comfortable,” he told Lovullo. “I’m fine with it.”

So, as the plan went, Vieira came set and dropped the ball. Home plate umpire Nick Mahrley called a balk. Maldonado advanced to third base.

Why did Torey Lovullo want to move Martin Maldonado from second base to third base?

According to Lovullo, Maldonado carries a strong reputation as a sign stealer. Thus, the Diamondbacks are hyperaware any time he is on second base. After all, that vantage point gives him the best possible view of both the pitcher and catcher, and a direct angle to communicate his findings to his teammates in the batter’s box.

Sure enough, after Maldonado doubled with one out in the third inning, the Diamondbacks determined that Maldonado knew what Vieira was throwing and was relaying it to the hitter.

“[Maldonado] was 9-for-9,” Lovullo said. “He didn’t miss one.”

Torey Lovullo told Thyago Vieira to balk in the third inning to move Martin Maldonado from second base to third base.

"Maldonado is very crafty. He was giving signs. He was 9-for-9 … We just felt like it was too risky.” pic.twitter.com/HzLVpDc38y

— Jesse Friedman (@JesseNFriedman) June 16, 2024

At that point, Lovullo was faced with a decision. He could either allow Maldonado to keep telling White Sox hitters what was coming, or he could end the sign stealing by giving Maldonado a free 90 feet.

Lovullo chose the latter. And, like many other things on Saturday night, the results did not go in his favor.

On the very next pitch, Vaughn got a fastball left out over the plate and lined it directly up the middle for an RBI single. That tied the game, 1-1, and the Diamondbacks never led again.

In retrospect, given that Maldonado is one of the baseball’s slowest baserunners, he might not have scored had Lovullo not moved him to third base on a balk.

After the game, Lovullo stood by his decision, even though it might have resulted in that run scoring.

“I don’t think that had a big impact,” Lovullo said. “Playing a 1-1 game, we’re trained for that; 1-0 and 1-1, that’s about the same thing.”

Lovullo said that he was more focused on preventing a big inning in which every White Sox hitter knew what was coming.

Ironically, Tommy Pham, the batter before Vaughn who presumably did know every pitch that was coming, harmlessly popped out in foul territory. It was that kind of night for the Diamondbacks.

Didn’t the PitchCom system do away with sign stealing?

When Major League Baseball originally introduced the PitchCom system in 2022, one of the primary benefits was cutting down on sign stealing. But when the system was put in place, manager Torey Lovullo knew that sign stealing was not gone for good.

“Not over by any means,” Lovullo said. “Players are really smart, and they’re figuring things out on a totally different level right now.”

While the PitchCom system (when it works) does mean that catchers no longer put down signs for pitches, Lovullo said that Maldonado could decipher Vieira’s pitches based on the way that he gripped the ball.

From the Diamondbacks’ vantage point, the flaw was simple: If Vieira rolled the ball at his side before putting it into his glove, that meant that he was throwing a slider. If he did not roll it and simply packed it into his glove, he was throwing a fastball.

Maldonado then had a creative way of relaying his discoveries to the hitter. The Diamondbacks caught on to that, but Lovullo declined to share Maldonado’s specific method with the media.

Is sign stealing legal?

Lovullo was adamant after the game that Maldonado’s actions were fully within his rights.

“It is not cheating whatsoever,” Lovullo said. “It is part of the game.”

Sign stealing — as long as it is not aided by electronic means, as was the case with the massive Houston Astros scandal in 2017 — is generally considered to be something of an art form.

Maldonado showed off his artistry on Saturday. The Diamondbacks countered, but they might have hurt themselves more than they helped themselves in the process.

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Top photo: Joe Camporeale/USA TODAY Sports