Boston Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester had a stellar performance in their 8-1 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 1 of the 2013 World Series, but he became a subject of controversy as he was accused of cheating.
Lester, who had eight strikeouts and allowed just five hits in 7 2/3 innings, was accused of doctoring the baseball after Cardinals' minor league player Tyler Melling posted a photo on his Twitter account.
The photo, which was quickly deleted, showed a yellow-green area on Lester's gloves and was captioned: "Jon Lester using a little Vaseline inside the glove tonight?"
The 29-year-old pitcher shrugged off the accusations against him, reiterating that he used nothing but rosin and that he has no plans of using other substance to his advantage.
"'I can honestly tell you that all I use is rosin. So, it's obviously frustrating that after a night like last night, we should be having fun and running around with some energy today and I've got to stand here and answer questions about it," Favre said an Associated Press report via Yahoo! Sports.
Red Sox manager John Farrell also came into Lester's defense, saying that "doctoring" accusation is a closed case as he reiterated that the left-hander pitcher only used rosin that Lester needs.
"From my perspective, if you know Jon Lester, he sweats like a pig and he needs rosin. And you know what, he keeps it in his glove. Other guys will keep it on their arm. Other guys will keep it on their pant leg. So that's my response to the allegations," Farrell said in an interview with ESPN.
Major League Baseball also issued a statement in which they said that there was no concrete evident to prove the cheating accusations against Lester.
"We cannot draw any conclusions from this video," the MLB said in a statement. "There were no complaints from the Cardinals and the umpires never detected anything indicating a foreign substance throughout the game."
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