Manfred denies MLB intentionally juices baseballs

Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred denied Tuesday the notion held by some players that the league is intentionally juicing baseballs.

"Baseball has done nothing, given no direction, for an alteration of the baseball," Manfred told reporters, according to Jeff Passan of ESPN.

Manfred also said this season's record spike in home runs is alarming for everybody involved in the game.

“The flaw in logic is that baseball wants more home runs," Manfred said, according to Joel Sherman of the New York Post. "If you sat in (an) owners meeting and listen to people on how the game is played, that is not a sentiment of owners for whom I work."

He added: "There's no desire among ownership to increase homers in the game, to the contrary, they are concerned about how many we have."

A total of 1,142 homers were hit in June, setting a new single-month record and besting the previous one-month benchmark set in May (1,135).

Asked whether MLB would alter the balls to reduce the number of round-trippers, Manfred acknowledged it's not out of the question.

"If we were going to do it, we would do it in a way that was transparent to the media and fans before making that change," he said, according to Mark Feinsand of MLB.com.

Manfred was also questioned about comments from Houston Astros ace Justin Verlander after the right-hander slammed the league Monday over the balls used this season.

"I'm not going to respond specifically. What we need (to) be is transparent," he said, according to Scott Miller of Bleacher Report. "I'm more than happy (to) have input, and I've had input, from starting pitchers."

Major League Baseball Players Association head Tony Clark also spoke Tuesday, answering bluntly when asked about the topic.

"I believe the ball suddenly changed and I don't know why," he said.