In what is rapidly turning into one of the most bizarre developing stories in baseball history, a Twitter account alleging to be the niece of Carlos Beltran is beginning to drop some of the most profound bombshells the MLB has ever seen.
A day after saying her uncle was stepping down as Mets manager a full 24 hours before the news of Beltran’s actual resignation officially broke, the mysterious account is now allegeding that Houston Astros superstars Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman wore ‘devices that buzzed’ on their shoulders, that were controlled by a hallway video guy who was already deciphering the signs of Houston opponents in real time.
The identity of the account has suddenly come into question, with ESPN’s Marly Rivera now saying that that the person who claims to be ‘Beltran’s niece’ is not related to the Beltrans, with Beltran’s family even telling Rivera that the account @S0_Blessed1 is ‘not related to the family in anyway.’”
Whoever the account may be, they were correct in their tweet saying Beltran was stepping down a day before it was announced, and Barstool Sports’ Dallas Braden says they were the first to announce that Beltran was being hired by the Mets before any major news outlet heard the news.
Moments after Beltran stepped down as New York Mets manager, the account tweeted on Thursday ‘I have pictures from locker [sic] I will keep for a rainy day. Altuve didn’t want shirt torn off if I remember [sic] maybe I misspoke but Chapman gave up HR in game.”
The account is referring to Altuve’s walk off home run off Yankees closer Aroldis Chapman in Game 6 of the American League Championship Series.
Video shows Altuve rounding third base and slowly approaching home plate as he appears to be motioning for his teammates to not rip his jersey off. You can see Altuve holding onto the top buttons of his jersey, to make sure it cannot be pulled down.
Instead of Altuve celebrating with his teammates after he hit one of the biggest home runs in baseball history, Altuve mysteriously rushed into the Astros dugout for a brief time – believed to have yanked off the device at that point.
Video of Fox Sports on-field reporter Ken Rosenthal interviewing Altuve moments after the walk-off versus Chapman then surfaced, with Rosenthal having taken notice of Altuve pleading with his teammates to not rip his jersey off. When Rosenthal straight up asked Altuve why he didn’t want his jersey ripped off, Altuve replied while giggling:
“I don’t know. I’m too shy. Last time they did that I got in trouble with my wife!”
Joel Sherman of the New York Post said he had reached out to Altuve’s agent Scott Boras about the ongoing developments with his client. Boras said emphatically that Altuve had immediately contacted him about the news declaring he had never worn an electronic device as a Major League player.
Here is what Sherman says Boras told him:
“When this came up today, Jose Altuve immediately contacted me and this is his statement: ‘I have never worn an electronic device in my performance as a major league player."
The 'I’m too shy!’ remarks were echoed by Boras as well, telling Sherman: "That is the shyness of Jose Altuve” and re-iterating that he didn’t want to be shirtless on national television.
The ‘I’m too shy’ excuse was heavily derided on Twitter, with dozens of users then uploading photos of Altuve celebrating with teammates while his jersey was being ripped off to expose his bare chest and entire upper body.
A picture of Altuve appearing to possibly be wearing a wire under his jersey also began circulating, although it was first erroneously to have occurred in 2019, when you can clearly see a patch on his shoulder displaying that it was from the 2017 World Series.
Current Major Leaguer Tommy Pham, an outfielder for the San Diego Padres posted the picture to his official Twitter account.
Users then uploaded graphics showing how Altuve’s home statistics during the 2017 Postseason absolutely dwarfed his road stats. Altuve hit .472 that year at Minute Maid Park opposed to .143 on the road. The graphic also displayed massive discrepancies with the home and road splits with Carlos Correa and Brian McCann as well.
Easily the peak of Thursday’s social media phenomenon was a picture of Astros outfielder Josh Reddick that almost broke the internet. Right after the reports from the Beltran ghost account, images from a postgame interview after Game 6 of the ALCS versus New York showed Reddick wearing just an undershirt, and having some sort of wire on his shoulder with a piece of tape securing it to his skin. At the time it seemed like the smoking gun to corroborate the 'buzzing devices' claim from the phantom account.
Sensing the firestorm that was erupting on Twitter, Major League Baseball quickly tried to tamp down the flames by making a public statement about the new videos surfacing.
Sherman reported that the statement issued by the league alluded to evidence from 2019 as well, so the video of Altuve may have already been looked into. The statement read:
“The MLB explored wearable devices during the investigation but found no evidence to substantiate it.”
The idea of Houston players wearing buzzers on their bodies is not new, but has only remained an internet conspiracy until today.
Late last year, Twitter user ‘@JomBoy’, who has become one of the leading amatuer sleuth accounts on Twitter covering the Astros sign-stealing scandal, offered video evidence of what looked to be a foreign object flying off the body of Astros catcher Robinson Chirinos after a big swing during an at bat during the 2019 World Series, with Chirinos quickly motioning to pick the mysterious object up.
The MLB handed down unprecedented punishments earlier in the week, suspending Astros GM Jeff Luhnow and manager AJ Hinch for a year, and docking first and second round picks from the team the next two seasons, but the league surprisingly held off suspending any players.
Red Sox manager Alex Cora and once-New York Mets manager Beltran would step down from their respective positions days later as well, as Cora was a bench coach for the 2017 World Series champion Astros, with Beltran being a veteran player on the team.
Video surfaced on Wednesday of Cora from last season after a blowout loss to the Yankees saying that Beltran was the team's 'biggest free agent signing', as Beltran was a special advisor to the Yankees last season. Cora made peculiar allusions to the Yankees potentially stealing the Red Sox signs during a 29-run two-game sweep of Boston in London.
It is unknown what the MLB actually knows about these 'buzzing devices', and whether they were aware of Altuve's involvement when they finished their initial investigation last week.
The identity of the 'Beltran's niece' Twitter account became even more muddled as Thursday progressed, with the son of former MLB star Gary Sheffield alleging that the account is a 'burner account' for a 'player that is in the league'.
The active Major League players who were easily the most vocal during the PR nuclear bomb were Reds starting pitching Trevor Bauer, and Indians starter Mike Clevinger.
Bauer outwardly took a victory on Twitter as the accusations unfurled, as Bauer has been the most vocal critic of the Astros’ mischief the last few seasons, and has gone on record accusing them of shady activity for years.
Clevinger took it a step further, saying the Astros should ‘be ashamed’ and added ‘I don’t think any of those mother*******s should be able to look us in the eye.'
As for the biggest loser of the Astros scandal?