Masahiro Tanaka said Monday that the Houston Astros' illegal sign-stealing cheated the New York Yankees of a spot in the 2017 World Series.

"Yeah," Tanaka told reporters when asked if he feels cheated, according to SNY's Danny Abriano. "You do feel that way. You do feel that way."

He added: "I don't know if mad is the right word. It's something that's out of the rule. They're obviously not abiding by the rules, so yeah. That's what I thought."

Former Yankees left-hander CC Sabathia said in January that he, too, felt the Astros robbed him of a chance to face the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series.

"As everything's been coming out, and the more facts that we get, it's getting frustrating, man, to sit here and know that late in my career, I could've had a title, maybe (2017) or maybe (2018), but we got cheated out of a team kind of doing something that's not within the rules of the game," Sabathia said.

Houston defeated New York in seven games in the 2017 American League Championship Series. It won all four contests at home in Minute Maid Park. The Astros went on to defeat the Dodgers to capture the franchise's first World Series.

Following an investigation, Major League Baseball suspended Astros manager AJ Hinch and GM Jeff Luhnow for one year - the team subsequently fired them - and forced Houston to sacrifice multiple draft picks and pay a $5-million fine.