Red Sox Cheated! Update: Cora Fired

[hrubes20]

40 minutes ago, mission27 said:

And tbh there is a lot of truth to the idea that baseball does this sort of **** and other sports dont

We have a toxic culture of thinking baseball is some sacred temple of morality that needs to be protected, which is horse**** 

In the NFL if you paralyze someone or punch your wife or kill someone or steal signs or take steroids or destroy your cell phone or whatever, you get a 4 game suspension and people get over it because they just want to watch football... there are probably a few of those things that deserve a slightly harsher punishment but the general attitude of “meh humans are human lets move on” is much healthier tbh

As a fan of a team that employed the POS Addison Russell during the entire 2019 season, I strongly disagree with this.

[ramssuperbowl99]

54 minutes ago, mission27 said:

Obviously there was a need to put a stop to this and punish perpetrators 

I think a year long suspension is enough of a punishment without saying these guys should be banned for life or are horrible human beings, which is what a lot of people are saying or implying 

I don't think Jeff Luhnow is a horrible human being because he didn't do anything to stop a cheating scandal. I think he's a horrible human being for all sorts of other reasons (how he treated his scouts, his plan to cut MiLB, the dbag front office culture he created in Houston, etc.). 

I don't think AJ Hinch is a horrible human being.

But each of them made a huge, huge mistake. The ****ed with the integrity of a $10 billion/year machine. You don't get to do that and keep your job, or get a slap on the wrist. The guy who blew up Chernobyl doesn't get to say "hey I made a mistake can I work at a different plant?" Sometimes the stakes are just too high.

Edited January 16, 2020 by ramssuperbowl99

[Thelonebillsfan]

Nobody but insane weirdos called them horrible human beings for cheating in sports, it's sports, they get paid ungodly sums of money to deal with a sport. Most people have perspective and tbh I think you're just making that up on the fly.

But, and this is crucial. If you cheat in sports, get caught, get told not to do it again and then do it again you probably shouldn't work in sports anymore.

[Leader]

1 hour ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

The guy who blew up Chernobyl doesn't get to say "hey I made a mistake can I work at a different plant?" Sometimes the stakes are just too high.

Actually the #2 guy at Chernobyl did work at a different nuclear plant - but only after taking a vacation at a labor camp.

[mission27]

2 hours ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

I don't think Jeff Luhnow is a horrible human being because he didn't do anything to stop a cheating scandal. I think he's a horrible human being for all sorts of other reasons (how he treated his scouts, his plan to cut MiLB, the dbag front office culture he created in Houston, etc.). 

I don't think AJ Hinch is a horrible human being.

But each of them made a huge, huge mistake. The ****ed with the integrity of a $10 billion/year machine. You don't get to do that and keep your job, or get a slap on the wrist. The guy who blew up Chernobyl doesn't get to say "hey I made a mistake can I work at a different plant?" Sometimes the stakes are just too high.

I guess I’m just too cynical to believe this was an isolated incident 

In order to be as mad about this as most people are I’d have to believe:

1. The Astros were doing something very far outside the norm of what other teams typically do

2. There was no reason for them to believe it wasn’t a big deal

3. It actually had a big impact on games 

My guess is the vast majority of teams were doing something... this was the most sophisticated and successful operation because it’s the Astros and they don’t do **** half assed and are always looking for an edge, but believing they were the only ones using tech that is universally available and unsupervised to try to gain an edge is like people who thought McGwire Sosa and Bonds were the only juicers.  Again I’m not saying other teams took it to this level but I’m not sure it matters.

Sign stealing is also something that’s been a part of the game for a long time. Yes this is different yes the commissioner made it clear this sort of thing wouldn’t be tolerated.  But I see it as fundamentally different from for example gambling on games or throwing games.  It’s just another example of people trying to gain an edge through slightly unconventional tactics.  So I can see how as a player or coach you might’ve thought this was against the rules but not per se a horrible thing to do.  Sort of like a corked bat or doctoring the baseball.  Gamesmanship that you’ll keep up until you get caught and they make you stop. 

To that point it was a widely held belief for YEARS that the Astros were doing this sort of thing and it kind of ticket people off but was joked about more than anything 

And finally I’m not convinced this actually had a significant impact on the outcome of the MLB playoffs the last two years.  The Astros clearly thought it wasn’t effective and abandoned it.  So in the grand scheme of things even as a fan of a team who lost to the Astros and Red Sox 3 of the last 3 seasons I’m mildly ticked off but being outraged seems too far tbh

 

[mission27]

And to your point about Luhnow may all be fair points I know nothing about the guy

But I think it just points to a lot of what is driving this vitriol 

People hate the Astros because they are annoying, because of the Ozuna thing, etc and the Astros and Sox are the two most successful orgs in the league over the last 5 years

If this was the Tampa Bay Rays people would care a lot less.  Even if it were the nationals 

[mission27]

6 minutes ago, mission27 said:

To that point it was a widely held belief for YEARS that the Astros were doing this sort of thing and it kind of ticket people off but was joked about more than anything 

And to smugly quote myself this to me is my fundamental issue with how people are reacting here

It reminds me so much of how people reacted to the steroid thing.  We knew for years players were juicing and the league and media and fans looked the other way or joked about it.  Then when they decided to take it seriously, a few people were selectively purged and we moved on.  That’s a really really bad approach.

Same thing here.  We knew for years the Astros and Red Sox and likely others were engaged in gamesmanship like this using tech and people looked the other way and laughed it off even when the evidence was pretty clear.  Now we’ve turned immediately into witch hunt mode. 

Nobody is asking why a GM or a team should be aware that his players are doing this but the commissioner shouldn’t by. Why the commissioner didn’t put any controls in place to make sure this sort of thing didn’t happen with replay technology and why he ignored REPEATED warnings about these two teams specifically over the last 3 years.  He let this get out of hand too to the point where it effected multiple World Series.  Should he be banned for life too?

[ramssuperbowl99]

18 hours ago, mission27 said:

I guess I’m just too cynical to believe this was an isolated incident 

In order to be as mad about this as most people are I’d have to believe:

1. The Astros were doing something very far outside the norm of what other teams typically do

2. There was no reason for them to believe it wasn’t a big deal

3. It actually had a big impact on games 

My guess is the vast majority of teams were doing something... this was the most sophisticated and successful operation because it’s the Astros and they don’t do **** half assed and are always looking for an edge, but believing they were the only ones using tech that is universally available and unsupervised to try to gain an edge is like people who thought McGwire Sosa and Bonds were the only juicers.  Again I’m not saying other teams took it to this level but I’m not sure it matters.

I don't see this not being an isolated incident as an argument for leniency in the punishment. In fact, I think it actually is a good argument for increasing the punishment as a deterrent to other teams.

At some level, teams and players all do the same math in their head: is the punishment less than, equal to, or greater than the benefit I get cheating times the odds I get caught? I'll confess I do the same thing in my life. I speed because I'm pretty sure I won't get caught going 10 over and if I do, I'll pay the couple hundred bucks in fines/insurance premiums. If the penalty for going 10 over was jail time, I'd go the speed limit.

Let's be real here, just like steroids, the MLB isn't going to be able to effectively police everything. So if you don't have harsh punishments, teams are going to keep doing this.

18 hours ago, mission27 said:

Sign stealing is also something that’s been a part of the game for a long time. Yes this is different yes the commissioner made it clear this sort of thing wouldn’t be tolerated.  But I see it as fundamentally different from for example gambling on games or throwing games.  It’s just another example of people trying to gain an edge through slightly unconventional tactics.  So I can see how as a player or coach you might’ve thought this was against the rules but not per se a horrible thing to do.  Sort of like a corked bat or doctoring the baseball.  Gamesmanship that you’ll keep up until you get caught and they make you stop. 

I'm halfway between you and the black and white "it's cheating" take. I don't think it's as bad as throwing games or anything like that, but I think using a computer and having guys on the bench of in the baseball ops room running signals to players is different in virtually every way than a runner on 2nd trying to point to the left to signal a breaking ball or something. The runner on 2nd is obvious, it only involves players who are on the field, the other team can adjust their signals, and then we're back to normal. It's not going to have a prolonged impact on games. The technology aided version of sign stealing is much more complex, it involves guys who aren't playing, it's not something the other team can adjust to change unless they are changing the signals on essentially every single pitch which would kill the pace of play, and there's really nothing that would prevent sign stealing on basically every single pitch.

To me, "normal sign stealing" like the simple guy on 2nd operation, is kind of like the hidden ball trick where you fake throw it to the pitcher or the 1st/3rd double steal player to try and sneak a run home. Cute little league stuff that isn't going to work, and is mostly left in so that the guys involved can laugh, shake their heads, and change the signs up. 

Corking the bat or doctoring the baseball is cheating, and definitely a step up. I think this is a step up even from that because of how pervasive this could be.

18 hours ago, mission27 said:

To that point it was a widely held belief for YEARS that the Astros were doing this sort of thing and it kind of ticket people off but was joked about more than anything 

And finally I’m not convinced this actually had a significant impact on the outcome of the MLB playoffs the last two years.  The Astros clearly thought it wasn’t effective and abandoned it.  So in the grand scheme of things even as a fan of a team who lost to the Astros and Red Sox 3 of the last 3 seasons I’m mildly ticked off but being outraged seems too far tbh

I agree with you that I don't think this had a significant effect on the outcome of the playoffs. Knowing what pitch was coming is valuable information, but it's not the whole picture. The simplest example is that I can tell you the next pitch Mariano Rivera was throwing was a cutter or Josh Hader's next pitch is probably a fastball, good luck hitting it. More generally, if I told you that someone was throwing you a fastball though, even if there were more hittable, that doesn't tell you where in the zone it's going to be or anything. If you expect down and away and it comes high and tight you might know what's coming but you're still not getting there.

Where I could anticipate impact is when guys are down in the count and pitchers are trying to make them wave at a breaking ball. If you know it's a breaking ball coming, you can safely say I'm not swinging at anything unless it's up in the zone or something like that. So the Astros probably dug themselves out of a few 0-2 counts, but I don't think on a generic 1-1 pitch that knowing what the other guy is throwing provides a huge advantage.

 

Ultimately, here's what it comes down to:

1. Manfred has to over punish as a deterrent because baseball is so poor at actually policing cheating
2. Manfred sent a notice that if this happens, he's holding the POBO/GM and manager accountable
3. The Astros POBO did absolutely nothing to stop this from happening, knew about it, lied during the investigation, and refused to acknowledge it even in the public statement he made once fired. He's done nothing to suggest that he'd correct any portion of his behavior, and therefore is a huge repeat offender risk.
4. The Astros manager destroyed a TV, but knew about it, and didn't stop this from happening
5. The MLB is a $10B/year machine, and the foundation of it is fair play. The history here is that if you poke the bear, you're done, don't pass go, don't collect $200, you're kicked.

 

I think you could argue Hinch shouldn't be banned for life. He wasn't orchestrating the scheme, and his real time actions mean I think it's a pretty short putt that if he was put in this situation again, he'd handle it appropriately. The guy just made a mistake.

Given what I said in 3 above, I don't see the argument for ever letting Luhnow run a baseball team again unless he has a come to jesus moment and earns a second chance. Believing in second chances isn't an all or nothing thing, we should approach stuff like that on a case by base basis, so even though every time this comes up there's a group of people yelling about SJW/PC/white knight/whatever new term, I don't really buy just vilifying the people who want him gone.

[ramssuperbowl99]

18 hours ago, mission27 said:

And to smugly quote myself this to me is my fundamental issue with how people are reacting here

It reminds me so much of how people reacted to the steroid thing.  We knew for years players were juicing and the league and media and fans looked the other way or joked about it.  Then when they decided to take it seriously, a few people were selectively purged and we moved on.  That’s a really really bad approach.

Same thing here.  We knew for years the Astros and Red Sox and likely others were engaged in gamesmanship like this using tech and people looked the other way and laughed it off even when the evidence was pretty clear.  Now we’ve turned immediately into witch hunt mode. 

Did we actually know this was ongoing? We knew the Red Sox got warned, and we knew Manfred sent out a notice. There were rumors, but I wouldn't say we knew of this happening. I follow baseball pretty closely, and if you asked me a year ago to name teams that might be stealing signs, the Red Sox and Astros would be two guesses, but I'd be guessing. We didn't have hard proof.

18 hours ago, mission27 said:

Nobody is asking why a GM or a team should be aware that his players are doing this but the commissioner shouldn’t by. Why the commissioner didn’t put any controls in place to make sure this sort of thing didn’t happen with replay technology and why he ignored REPEATED warnings about these two teams specifically over the last 3 years.  He let this get out of hand too to the point where it effected multiple World Series.  Should he be banned for life too?

You can ask that question, but Manfred sent out a notice to the teams. It's not like he didn't do anything, he said "here are the expectations, don't **** this up".

That said, l I don't think Manfred has handled this well at all.

His immediate reaction to the Red Sox getting caught should have been to allow the pitcher and catcher to have a signal system besides their hands. Some transmitter thing that can show the pitch number. Then this is over and done with, no WS implications, no major scandal, and no Jessica Mendoza taking a dump live on national television.

Bud Selig still rightfully gets crap for how he handled the steroid era, hopefully Manfred will get crap for how he handled this. He definitely deserves it.

[mission27]

Manfred sent out a notice, my guess is Luhnow forwarded it on, whats the difference, they’re both responsible as is Crane for the conduct of MLB players on the Astros

At the end of the day you can say the difference is Luhnow was aware of what was going on and Manfred wasn’t, but Luhnow denies he was aware and Manfred should very much have been aware; my guess is they both knew or suspected something was going on, likely did not know the details, and didn’t really want to look too hard

There were numerous complaints against these teams over the last 3-4 years from the Yankees alone, I’m sure from other teams... doesn’t seem like any serious attempt was made to investigate in the early stages... Manfred should have known something was up, when there is this much smoke their is usually fire, as pretty much every fan and media person could have told you a year ago 

Clearly the players cooked this up and the coaching staff, front office, ownership, and MLB were all negligent in letting this go on, because making a big deal about it was bad for business.  All I’m saying is the responsibility here is being very narrowly applied to 4 people because that’s easier than addressing that this was a systemic issue in the league and pretty much everyone across the sport has some responsibility  

 

[mission27]

Im with you that I doubt Luhnow had no knowledge whatsoever of what was going on... if you and I knew full well the Astros were stealing signs their GM probably had some idea 

I dont doubt that he was unaware of the specifics and chose to look the other way because his team was winning and they were the smartest, hardest charging org in baseball and it was just what they do... similar tbh to the position Crane was in

Yeah that’s a problem but doesn’t seem to justify a lifetime ban when there are a million other people inside and outside of the Astros organization who were also negligent or active participants and aren’t being punished at all 

Its really a difference of perspective... if I’m him, I’m thinking I didn’t really know what was going on, this was an on the field thing, not my purview, the other guys are much more responsible, and Crane stabbed me in the back to save his skin 

 

[mission27]

I agree its worse than corking a bat or doctoring a ball, mostly because of the scope and scale of what they did... if they’d done this once, I’d say it was pretty similar

Steroids had a huge impact on the field of play too, doesn’t mean Bonds et al should have been black balled... all of us have been bitching about Bonds being black balled for years 

Tbh similar to steroids I am 100% confident in saying whatever the Astros did did not damage the $10B baseball machine

Just like steroids brought people back to the park, everyone drooled all over themselves when Altuve and Bregman were hitting home run after home run vs the Dodgers 

Sure its a bad news cycle, but at the end of the day people assume there is gamesmanship and cheating in the game, it doesn’t have the same impact of throwing games or crooked refs, this is just another in a long line of cheating scandals that will have minimal impact on viewership 

[mission27]

5 hours ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

Did we actually know this was ongoing? We knew the Red Sox got warned, and we knew Manfred sent out a notice. There were rumors, but I wouldn't say we knew of this happening. I follow baseball pretty closely, and if you asked me a year ago to name teams that might be stealing signs, the Red Sox and Astros would be two guesses, but I'd be guessing. We didn't have hard proof.

And its the same with steroids right?

Any sane person watching baseball in the 90s and 00s seeing guys jaws grow 50% and guys like Brady Anderson hitting 50 homers... along with the whispers around the league about PEDs... would’ve known what was going on.  But fans and the media and the league chose to look the other way for years.

Any sane person watching the Astros midget brigade hit home run after home run in 2017 playoffs in the biggest spots, watching them run through the playoffs with absurd home road splits, and given numerous complaints from other players and teams, would’ve known what was going on.  And most of us assumed.  But there was always the plausible deniability of “the Astros are the smartest org in baseball and they’ve never been proven to have cheated.” 

In both cases everyone looked the other way because it was good for business, until it wasn’t, and then pretended it was limited to a few high profile people in the sport and purged them in a way that was completely unfair and disproportionate and not good for the game.  People are starting to wake up to that truth when it comes to steroids, but a lot of the damage is done.  Its probably going to take some time to separate us from the emotions of this situation before people feel the same way about this. 

Edited January 17, 2020 by mission27

[drew39k]

Title* Town

 

[BullsandBroncos]

Doesn't matter. Our Pitching won us everything that season. Not our hitters.