Christian Yelich Rips Yu Darvish After Being Accused of Stealing Cubs SP's Signs

Milwaukee Brewers right fielder Christian Yelich offered a pointed response to Chicago Cubs starting pitcher Yu Darvish on Friday regarding accusations that he may have stolen signs:

Darvish initially responded to a Bleacher Nation series of tweets in which they provided video they imply is evidence that Yelich may have stolen signs (without directly accusing him of doing so). 

Following Yelich's initial remark to Darvish, the Cubs pitcher clarified that he wasn't directly accusing the 2018 National League MVP or the Brewers of sign stealing:

Darvish also retweeted Tim Stebbins of NBC Sports Chicago's defense of him:

There are multiple contextual layers to this story.

For one, Ken Rosenthal and Evan Drellich of The Athletic reported that the Houston Astros were accused of stealing signs during their 2017 World Series championship run.

In response, St. Louis Cardinals beat writer Jeff Jones wrote that "multiple players" identified the Astros, Brewers and Texas Rangers "as the most egregious with electronic sign stealing."

Darvish, then of the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2017, faced the Astros in the World Series. The right-hander did not fare well in two losing Fall Classic starts, giving up eight earned runs over 3.1 innings and allowing half of his batters faced to reach base.

On another note, Tim Healey of Newsday recalled some friction between Yelich and Darvish when the former player was on the Miami Marlins:

Yelich is 4-of-11 lifetime against Darvish with two solo home runs and three walks. They may face each other again soon after the 2020 season begins, as the Cubs will visit the Brewers for a three-game set beginning March 26 to open their campaigns.