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Ex-Astros slugger Gattis offers lengthy apology for sign-stealing

Stephen Brashear / Getty Images Sport / Getty

Warning: Story contains coarse language

Former Houston Astros slugger Evan Gattis apologized for the team's illegal sign-stealing operation during their run to the 2017 World Series championship.

Gattis, one of the primary catchers on that infamous 2017 team, held nothing back while admitting the squad deserves all the scorn they've received for their actions.

"I'm not asking for sympathy or anything like that," Gattis said on The Athletic's "755 Is Real" podcast, according to Peter Botte of the New York Post. "If our punishment is being hated by everybody forever, just like, whatever. I don't know what should be done, but something had to fucking be done. I do agree with that, big time. I do think it's good for baseball that we're cleaning it up … And I understand that it's not fucking good enough to say sorry. I get it."

Gattis explained that while not every player on the team was happy with the cheating, the Astros players got a little too "caught up" in the scheme.

"It got out of fucking control," Gattis said. "That's why I'm actually glad that the objective truth is out there. We fucked up, and it was not right. It was wrong. It's a little easier to see it being fucked up afterwards.

"Don't get me wrong, I'm very happy we won the World Series … But once that all fades, now it's kind of different. That happened and we cheated. You can't feel that good about it."

Gattis, who recently confirmed his retirement from baseball, made news on social media earlier this week when he tweeted an image of a novelty glass featuring Fiers' face and the words "snitches get stitches." He later clarified it wasn't meant to have been a shot at the whistle-blowing pitcher.

The 33-year-old spent four of his six major-league seasons in Houston, and last played in 2018. During the Astros' championship campaign, he slashed .263/.311/.457 with 12 homers and 55 RBIs over 84 games and added another eight hits in the playoffs.

Gattis is one of the first Astros position players to issue a full-scale apology for the illegal sign-stealing. Star infielders Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman offered brief statements of apology at the start of spring training but haven't spoken about it since.

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