Posted on 01/15/2020 2:47:45 PM PST by nickcarraway
The kneecapping of the Houston Astros went off Monday in exquisite fashion. Big names were fired. Draft picks were revoked. A record fine was levied. Pounds of flesh were exacted from egregious cheaters. The optics worked. The Astros' comeuppance was here, and it was severe. Major League Baseball was righting an obvious wrong.
As the day rolled on and people around baseball pondered exactly what had happened, a less obvious version of the story emerged. It was all so tidy, all so clean, so carefully orchestrated and meticulously calibrated -- like something the Astros, ever lauded for their efficiency and ruthlessness, might concoct.
Gone were general manager Jeff Luhnow and manager AJ Hinch, first suspended by the league for a year, then fired by owner Jim Crane, even as MLB's investigation into Houston's sign-stealing scheme determined it was "player-driven." Gone too were their first- and second-round draft picks for 2020 and 2021, painful but not crippling. And that record fine? All of $5 million, couch-cushion change for every owner in baseball -- and the most commissioner Rob Manfred can levy under the MLB constitution, which speaks to the limitations of the position.
It is a job of extreme compromise, of politicking, of figuring out how to appease the 30 billionaires who are his bosses, and Manfred's handling of the cheating scandal -- the biggest of his commissionership so far and one that cut to the heart of the game's integrity -- offered remarkable insight into how he runs the sport. As much as MLB played the big, bad monolith in delivering the ruinous news from on high, this was not some unilateral punishment for the Astros. It was a sneak peek inside the sausage factory of power and the anger that Crane's relative acquittal caused across the league.
Multiple ownership-level sources told ESPN that dissatisfaction with the penalties had emerged following a conference call with Manfred, in which he explained how the Astros would be disciplined, then told teams to keep their thoughts to themselves.
"The impression," one person familiar with the call told ESPN, "was that the penalty for complaining would be more than Houston got."
The concern over any possible discipline for breaking ranks didn't entirely silence teams. At 12:30 a.m. ET on Tuesday, the Los Angeles Dodgers, who lost the 2017 World Series in seven games to an Astros team that MLB's investigation confirmed cheated during that postseason, released a statement that read: "All clubs have been asked by Major League Baseball not to comment on today's punishment of the Houston Astros as it's inappropriate to comment on discipline imposed on another club. The Dodgers have also been asked not to comment on any wrongdoing during the 2017 World Series and will have no further comment at this time."
Run through a passive-aggressive translator, the Dodgers' words mirrored what a team president had said earlier in the day.
"Crane won," he said. "The entire thing was programmed to protect the future of the franchise. He got his championship. He keeps his team. His fine is nothing. The sport lost, but Crane won."
On a day when a well-regarded manager and a successful executive lost their jobs and the 1919 Black Sox were invoked as comparables, it was easy to miss how MLB soft-pedaled Crane's punishment. In the first paragraph of Manfred's nine-page statement outlining the league's investigation, he addressed the original report by The Athletic that spurred the controversy. How there was "significant concern" that what the Astros were alleged to have done violated "the principles of sportsmanship and fair competition" and how he treats such threats to the game with "the utmost seriousness." He continued: "I believe in transparency." And then, after that on-point thesis, came two completely out-of-place sentences.
"At the outset," Manfred wrote, "I also can say our investigation revealed absolutely no evidence that Jim Crane, the owner of the Astros, was aware of any of the conduct described in this report. Crane is extraordinarily troubled and upset by the conduct of members of his organization, fully supported my investigation, and provided unfettered access to any and all information requested."
The absolution of Crane so early in the document came as no surprise. Crane said he saw details of the league's punishment over the weekend. It allowed him to introduce himself as a do-something organizational shepherd. He announced the firings of Luhnow and Hinch on live TV, generating maximum effect. He promised "the Astros will become stronger -- a stronger organization because of this today." Months of misery -- beginning with former assistant GM Brandon Taubman's post-ALCS outburst at three female reporters that led to his firing, continuing with the revelation of cheating and culminating in this -- had made it fairly evident that for all of the strength Crane tries to project, fundamental weaknesses exist throughout the Astros organization.
Much of Manfred's document was incriminatory, particularly the details of the scheme as laid out by MLB investigators and a section in which the commissioner referred to the Astros' organizational culture as "problematic" and blamed it on "an environment that allowed the conduct described in this report to have occurred." The words were necessary and important -- and entirely dismissed by Crane, who said: "I don't agree with that."
"Did you notice," another team president said, "he never said 'Sorry'?"
Crane didn't, though it also took him six days to say the word to the Sports Illustrated reporter whom the organization tried to smear after she wrote how Taubman had gloated that he was "so f---ing glad we got Osuna," a reference to closer Roberto Osuna, who was acquired while still under a lengthy suspension for domestic violence. On Monday, Crane did apologize to fans, sponsors and the city of Houston. Not the teams the Astros beat while cheating or the sport his franchise's actions put in this position.
For Crane to offer anything beyond the hollow and perfunctory would have been an upset. While MLB's standard for the punishment was reasonable and rational -- the league targeted violations after the Sept. 15, 2017, memo Manfred distributed that said violations of the league's technology policy would fall on teams' general manager and manager -- Crane said he fired them because "(n)either one of them started this, but neither one of them did anything about it."
The same, of course, could be said of him. Either Crane did not know that the business he owns and operates was cheating or he did know and did nothing about it. Neither is good.
None of this, actually, is good. Baseball is far from done with sign-stealing scandals. The league has launched an investigation into the Boston Red Sox after The Athletic reported they used a video replay room to decode signs in their championship-winning 2018 season. Boston manager Alex Cora was previously the bench coach for the 2017 Astros and was implicated by Manfred's report as a central figure in Houston's adoption of a system in which players used an illegal camera feed to crack sign sequences and feed pitch types live to hitters via banging a baseball bat against a trash can. Between the evidence incriminating Cora and Hinch's firing paving the way for managerial dismissals, the end of Cora's time in Boston could be coming, two sources with knowledge of the team's thinking told ESPN.
If Hinch and Cora are both out, the onus then shifts to the New York Mets and Carlos Beltran, who must decide whether they want to be the only team standing by a manager whose name shows up in a report that details rampant cheating. Manfred's report named Beltran as one of the players involved in the scheme, though the league did not discipline him because it gave players immunity in exchange for their testimony.
That choice registered publicly as another curious part of Manfred's ultimate decision. What sort of disciplinary action clears players for a "player-driven" scheme? The answer is a practical one. Between the well-defined lines that held GMs and managers responsible and the fear of the Major League Baseball Players Association defending any discipline against active players and sending the cases into grievance hell, Manfred's pragmatism here, though not satisfying, is understandable.
Already this has stretched beyond his level of comfort. Initially, Manfred planned on limiting the investigation to the Astros. Now MLB is looking into the Red Sox -- and considering that their use of an Apple Watch to relay signs in August 2017 was the original sin of modern technological cheating, the penalties for any second offense could be severe. Though they're the only other team with a known investigation pending, Sports Illustrated reported that the Astros named eight other teams they believe cheated in 2017 and 2018 -- and Crane said "the commissioner assured me that every team and every allegation will be checked out."
That sounds far-fetched, like the sort of politicking a commissioner does to placate one of his bosses. What Manfred can do is fast-track the announcement of a new policy on the in-game use of technology, one that holds players and management accountable and entails the sort of harsh penalties Luhnow and Hinch received. The sport needs buy-in from all parties to actually move on.
Hinch tried. In a statement, he apologized and acknowledged that he could've tried to do better -- to tell players and coaches to stop instead of breaking the video monitor twice in protest. He didn't. There wasn't much sympathy for Hinch's actions around baseball, but there was a willingness to forgive. Executives agreed: He'll manage again after being suspended through the end of the next World Series.
Like Crane, Luhnow apologized to the team, the fans and the city. He said in a statement, "I am not a cheater." That doesn't exactly square with the fact that the team he ran cheated during its championship-winning season and with the information in Manfred's report that "at least two emails sent to Luhnow" informed him of replay-review room sign decoding, about which he did nothing. Luhnow continued to try to clear himself of responsibility while blaming "players" and "low-level employees working with the bench coach." Considering his apparent affinity for throwing people under the bus, let us hope Luhnow's next career does not involve large motor vehicles.
The rest of baseball is bracing for the fallout of the Astros' punishment, and most do believe one purpose was served: that Manfred's disciplinary choices will prompt the rank-and-file to avoid any sort of electronically aided sign-stealing schemes.
"It will scare employees of MLB teams from cheating, at least for a while," one high-ranking executive said, "and the man who owns the team gets to enjoy his ring. He gets off lightly and can start with a clean slate."
This refrain was common inside the game, and it came with a question that was rhetorical-but-not-really, one that illustrated how Jim Crane won the day that his franchise lost. How many owners in baseball would trade $5 million, four high draft picks and the firing of their GM and manager in exchange for a World Series title?
Twenty-five? Twenty-eight? All 30? "I don't know that I would," one team president said, "but I don't know that I wouldn't." It was an honest answer. The decisions made in search of championships, in service of winning, are complicated. Right and wrong blur. It's why Manfred chafes at the complaints of owners. How many are being honest about what they'd do in that same scenario?
Whatever the answer, the remaining two mentions of Crane in Manfred's report do yeoman's work of clearing him. The first said it was "difficult to question" Crane giving Luhnow responsibility of baseball operations. The second stated, as fact, that Crane "was unaware of any of the violations of MLB rules by his club." And that was it. A thorough and impressive whitewashing. Tidy, clean, carefully orchestrated, meticulously calibrated. The Houston Astros, same as they ever were.
The number of people here defending cheating is disheartening.
There are reports, which MLB is staunchly denying, that the Astros used buzzers under their shirts to get signs in 2019. That may be why the Nationals were changing signals constantly in the World Series.
MLB says they investigated this allegation and it didn’t happen, but multiple sources say that it did.
A Twitter user claiming to be Carlos Beltran’s niece says they used the buzzers and specifically names Altuve and Bregman. The family says the account is not that of Beltran’s niece, but whoever it is had the news of Beltran’s hiring and his firing before it became public.
This was retweeted by a user called Jomboy, who has posted the first reports on some stories, retweeted the tweets from “Bletran’s niece,” with video of Altuve after his ALCS-winning homerun telling his teammates to be careful not to remove his shirt. (Apparently, that’s an Astros thing.) Jomboy said that he had five sources who told him about the buzzers.
Jomboy’s tweet, with the tweet from “Beltran’s niece” and the video attached, was then retweeted by Cincinnati Reds pitcher Trevor Bauer, who said he had heard this from multiple sources.
But MLB insists there is no evidence that they used the devices.
The World Champion Nationals were changing signals constantly.
The Staten Island Yankees are having a miniature trash can giveaway this summer.
So how did the Nationals beat them? Better, more sophisticated cheating?
I guess I wouldn’t be shocked now. The independent camera with a feed of the catcher’s signs hooked up to a buzzer under clothing seems to be pretty unbeatable. Who knows if it’s true, but I do recall Altuve getting pretty upset that his teammates were trying to rip his jersey off in celebration after a win. He said his wife was upset at him being shirtless I think. On the other hand, you would think his teammates wouldn’t have tried that if there was something to expose and everyone was in on it.
I also recall that teams were going to start measuring biometric feedback, I wonder if that involves electrodes and wires. Of course that in itself would be a pretty good cover to explain the hardware I guess.
Freegards
They had a strategy going into the series because there were rumblings about the Astros and sign stealing. I recall some whistling that might have been signals and Strasburg legitimately tipping and then correcting it. I think the Nats used a rotating sign designator system which stops any sort of sign stealing, whether legitimate or relayed video like the Astros used. It’s kind of amazing to me that it isn’t a universal and standard practice between catchers and pitchers with today’s technology.
Freegards
“And the bottom line is MLB has warned teams explicitly for years about doing this very thing.”
From the beginning of baseball, a man on 2nd base has endeavored to convey the called pitch to the batter. They’ve developed innumerable schemes and signs for it. It’s expected, and it’s unreliable.
But putting a hidden camera, giving a TV view of signs in real time is a whole nuther level of dirty. They can see every sign in every situation and begin building a database to decode the entire signing scheme and it’s rotations.
And they can play it back over and over to be sure, comparing the signs to the resultant pitch, or the Manager’s signs to the steal/non-steal etc.
By the time you’re 1/2 through the season, you know with relative certainty what the other team intends to do in the moment and it’s easy to convey that info to players on the field with your own signs, or miniature electronic devices.
The advantage in a game that truly is decided in millimeters and milliseconds is incalculable. But very big.
Filthy, Rotten. Far worse than the gamblers and the dopers.
Yes, Aaron Boone complained about the whistling in the ALCS.
If you do it with your own eyes and ears, on the field, that is part of the game. If you use technological means to gain an advantage that isn’t available to the other team, that’s cheating.
The buzzer system would probably be less detectable than banging on the trash can. Especially if it’s more in vibrate mode.
You could have a coach in the dugout with a Jeopardy! style buzzer device setting off the buzzer under the shirt and others would have a hard time detecting it.
The poster Jomboy says he has five sources who say the Astros were using a buzzer system, naming Altuve and Bregman, among others, and Trevor Bauer says several different people have mentioned it to him. Yet MLB says there is no evidence of any such system.
There were more cheers than boos. We had that discussion at the time.
The Nats were on to you and took extraordinary measures to protect themselves.
Don’t think Rendon won’t share those methods with the Angels.
There has been talk about instituting electronic communication between the dugout and the pitcher and catcher. Something similar to the devices in a quarterback’s helmet.
Especially in the commissioner’s memo after the Apple Watch scandal.
If MLB really really wanted to make a statement, they should suspend every player on that 2017 Astros roster for the first 10 games of the 2020 season. No matter what club they play for now. That would get the player’s and owner’s attention.
Freegards
How is the use of signs not cheating?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.