I know pretty much everyone here (myself included) thinks that the way the commissioner handled this whole situation is a bunch of BS and a ridiculous double standard.
I went back and looked at the Astros report and found a couple examples from both how the management and the club as a whole were held responsible.
The GM forwarded a few emails, so there's no way they could have known someone was cheating:
Quote:
I do not find that Cora or any member of the Red Sox staff either knew or should have known that Watkins was utilizing in-game video to update the information that he had learned from his pregame analysis.
There was no evidence that the Red Sox front office or then-Manager John Farrell were involved in or aware of this practice.
But no matter what Lunow knew or didn't know, he should have stopped it:
Quote:
Regardless of the level of Luhnow's actual knowledge, the Astros' violation of rules in 2017 and 2018 is attributable, in my view, to a failure by the leaders of the baseball operations department and the Field Manager to adequately manage the employees under their supervision, to establish a culture in which adherence to the rules is ingrained in the fabric of the organization, and to stop bad behavior as soon as it occurred
As far as the sign stealing and relaying took place:
Quote:
Initially, Watkins communicated the sign sequence information in person in the replay room to a player serving as a "runner," who was then responsible for relaying the sign information to the players in the dugout, who would communicate it to the baserunner on second base, who would use it to interpret the catcher's signs and transmit the coming pitch type to the batter.
So figuring out a way to relay signs straight to the batter instead of using a runner on 2nd is worth $5M and 3 early round draft picks? Give me a break.
Manfred and the way he has handled this whole situation is a freaking joke.