Buzz on Baseball's Worst Scandal in Decades

Man, I hope you are the prosecutor when I go on a crime spree. “These things happened. They. All. Happened. All of them!” It’s why stripping the Astros' World Series title is nonsensical, and it’s why Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Rose, and Jackson all belong in The Hall." Why punish the guilty and strip away their ill-gotten gains? It's called justice and making things things right. The Astros are low down dirty cheaters and deserve no titles and no rewards. Why is it ok to cheat, get rewarded with a World Series championship, then get a slap on the wrist a few years later? It isn't. The Astros must not be allowed to keep their title. If they do it threatens the integrity of the game. What a joke. Yes, your Honor I robbed that bank. These things happened. Why don't you give me a slap on the wrist and let me keep my dirty money and freedom. That's basically what has happened so far with the Astros. If a student cheats on a test and gets caught do they get to keep their grade? No. They are given an F and punished. I will never recognize the Astros as 2017 champions. I don't understand the logic of not dropping the hammer on the Astros and stripping their title. Yes, it happened. So what. It's time for the Astros to make restitution. I am hopping mad and want heads to roll for real. Take the title away.

This is the steroid crisis of the analytical era.  Camera's on everything means there is no hiding and video of every second.  First it was a breakthrough that let savvy teams exploit the advantage and now it has evolved, as things usually do, to also offer a new way to cheat.

It seems early on it was a kinda a caveman approach to utilizing the cheat.  Dude in the hallway says off speed, bang on a trash can or whistle, effective but pretty traceable if noticed.  If wearable tech is true that is the next evolution and I don't know how it could be proved or noticed. 

We have come to point with technology what will game evolve into because video taping and real time communication is going to make it impossible to to monitor. What is to pervent even single player from hiring people to communicating this information to him when he's at bat during a game. All it would take wifi transmitter to cell phone to one in the crowd to receive images off in field camera's and that person again communicating it to a player via cell phone again that would alert him to the pitch he's receiving. Because of this we have had slowing of the game to try to just pervent sign stealing. Is it that we need to add more technology so we get away from physical form of communication or is that we ban baseball from using any video replay which i find almost impossible in this day with current technology. I have to believe if the game is going to continue we need to come to some form ethical behavior that can't be crossed. The under lying problem is money now involved in the game and attitude win at all costs even when you know youre cheating. I believe this has been not limited to to Boston and Houston and i am willing to bet this has been done by number of other clubs over the years with some sort of cheating. Even clubs may have not know of cheating but it was done by individual players getting around the rules because amount of money involved for success may have paid off in great returns. Just like we had with drugs and steroids era the returns were way more than costs.

Baseball is going to need to sit down as industry work out how they can keep integrity of the game. This is just not management and owners but it also includes the players and the agents, and also the media in coming up with plan to restore the faith in the game or it will die as sport and business because of this drive to win at all costs. Yes we need to compete but it has to be done fairly and follow set of rules the players,ownership and fans all can agree upon. To do this i think that penalties have to be very strict and almost like death sentence for offending parties this includes players, managenent, and owners. Like if your caught cheating finds strips of both of accomplishments as welll as money you have made. For players there would be automatic life bans and fines that represent percentage of career earnings from the game. Management same again lifetime ban and significant fines to be paid. Ownership this should be special here with large fines and lifetime bans with ultimate punishment that they have to sell club for what they purchased the club for. All these measures seem high but if punishment is not set high there will be no policing by various clubs with this risks are so high that nobody would want to even think about cheating and each of these groups would be monitoring each other because of risk of punishment. These are my thoughts on this latest cheating scandal this is in my mind only way to clean this game up in the future.

Let me toss this briquet into the inferno. Even prior to this scandal, I began to feel that something is amiss...something is....not healthy? about the visual optics of MLB telecasts. Probably since the mid 60's, the use of the center field TV camera angle employing an ginormous telephoto lens to frame the pitcher and batters box at the start of EVERY pitch is simply taken for granted and what we comfortably expect to see as we watch a game? OK...when introduced and full disclosure, I'm old enough to remember, that TV shot was AMAZING! Finally, we could actually SEE movement on the pitch and where it crossed the plate! Umpires...we SEE your missed call!

Now we have a chyron box that shows the STRIKE ZONE!. Bad call! 

All fine and good...up to a point.

Throughout the entire history of baseball, centerfield seats were the butt joke of suckers who were cheap and never forked over the $$ for infield seats. Nobody wanted to watch a MLB in centerfield..who does now unless you carry a portable Hubble Telescope?

VIP's and "beautiful" people sat directly behind home plate...the Ultimate ticket!

Or behind the dugouts....woo hoo, close to the action!

Cut to the chase...

Could MLB Media/ESPN/Regional Fox Sports Networks etc, experiment ( emphasis on experiment) with broadcasting select games using multiple cameras from many angles as seen by the fans in attendance of a game....no center field "live" shot unless it factors into a play significantly. Show the game as the FANS in attendance see?

From behind the plate...along the lines...from the 3rd deck?

I'm certain the reaction would be hugely negative but thats to be expected after 50+ years addicted to the same center field camera view?

Time for MLB to present this most glorious game from a new, fresh (jarring?) perspective? Bonus...no cameras always showing catcher signs....hmmmm????

Change is never easy or comfortable..but with the sad events of the last week, maybe the time is now to take a bold, new, 2020 look at how MLB is presented electronically?

Man, I hope you are the prosecutor when I go on a crime spree. “These things happened. They. All. Happened. All of them!” It’s why stripping the Astros' World Series title is nonsensical, and it’s why Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Rose, and Jackson all belong in The Hall." Why punish the guilty and strip away their ill-gotten gains? It's called justice and making things things right. The Astros are low down dirty cheaters and deserve no titles and no rewards. Why is it ok to cheat, get rewarded with a World Series championship, then get a slap on the wrist a few years later? It isn't. The Astros must not be allowed to keep their title. If they do it threatens the integrity of the game. What a joke. Yes, your Honor I robbed that bank. These things happened. Why don't you give me a slap on the wrist and let me keep my dirty money and freedom. That's basically what has happened so far with the Astros. If a student cheats on a test and gets caught do they get to keep their grade? No. They are given an F and punished. I will never recognize the Astros as 2017 champions. I don't understand the logic of not dropping the hammer on the Astros and stripping their title. Yes, it happened. So what. It's time for the Astros to make restitution. I am hopping mad and want heads to roll for real. Take the title away.

The World Series should be vacated. Illegal acts should not be awarded. The only reason this wasn't done is because the commissioner reports to the owners. 

Fiers should be praised by every baseball fan. Fiers could have been anonymous but he was willing to take the heat. An ESPN baseball announcer thought Fiers was wrong in coming public. She is wrong. Cheating is wrong. Cora and other Astro cheaters unfairly stained everyone in that dugout. Obviously Hinch, Fiers, and probably others were repulsed by the cheaters but sport culture and peer pressure are hard to overcome (not justifying their no-action during the cheating time period).    

There should be wide spread investigation w/ incentive for player to come forward & severe punishment for all who lie & cheat in this matter. Especially in PS.

Until the penalty is greater than the reward, there really is no reason to stop trying to get away with whatever you can. Polanco signed a extension after his suspension, Nelson Cruz has went on to make 10's of millions of dollars, Pineda signed a 20 million dollar contract while on suspension.

Take away they teams championships and the teams still got the profits from the championship doesn't mean anything.

Let me toss this briquet into the inferno. Even prior to this scandal, I began to feel that something is amiss...something is....not healthy? about the visual optics of MLB telecasts. Probably since the mid 60's, the use of the center field TV camera angle employing an ginormous telephoto lens to frame the pitcher and batters box at the start of EVERY pitch is simply taken for granted and what we comfortably expect to see as we watch a game? OK...when introduced and full disclosure, I'm old enough to remember, that TV shot was AMAZING! Finally, we could actually SEE movement on the pitch and where it crossed the plate! Umpires...we SEE your missed call!

Now we have a chyron box that shows the STRIKE ZONE!. Bad call! 

All fine and good...up to a point.

Throughout the entire history of baseball, centerfield seats were the butt joke of suckers who were cheap and never forked over the $$ for infield seats. Nobody wanted to watch a MLB in centerfield..who does now unless you carry a portable Hubble Telescope?

VIP's and "beautiful" people sat directly behind home plate...the Ultimate ticket!

Or behind the dugouts....woo hoo, close to the action!

 

Cut to the chase...

Could MLB Media/ESPN/Regional Fox Sports Networks etc, experiment ( emphasis on experiment) with broadcasting select games using multiple cameras from many angles as seen by the fans in attendance of a game....no center field "live" shot unless it factors into a play significantly. Show the game as the FANS in attendance see?

From behind the plate...along the lines...from the 3rd deck?

I'm certain the reaction would be hugely negative but thats to be expected after 50+ years addicted to the same center field camera view?

 

Time for MLB to present this most glorious game from a new, fresh (jarring?) perspective? Bonus...no cameras always showing catcher signs....hmmmm????

 

Change is never easy or comfortable..but with the sad events of the last week, maybe the time is now to take a bold, new, 2020 look at how MLB is presented electronically?

In a time were baseball is having a hard time keeping fans interested they are going to make the game even harder or less entertaining for the fans? That isn't happening.

They need to to penalize the teams with money and draft picks and change the penalty going forward to something that will actually deter the teams from cheating.

And lots of people want to give the players a break, they were the ones cheating, if you really want to hurt the astros and others, ban the players like they do for steroids.
 

Pete Rose bet on his team to win. Shoeless Joe played extremely well in the World Series in 1919. Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens were never suspended, and drug testing wasn’t even done until 2003. What the Astros and other teams did was clearly illegal, and should be treated similarly to steroid suspensions. I’m not saying for life: 3 of the best players on the Twins have got busted for drug use in the past, but have came back after a long suspension. The players need to be suspended for a bit. If the legends previously stated don’t make the Hall of Fame, I doubt Beltran and Altuve will have much of a shot in the future.

Possible solutions going forward.  1).  Eliminate teams ability to review plays before issuing a  challenge.  The video feeds for this were an enabling feature for the cheating.  2).  Allow pitchers and catchers to communicate electronically.  The example here is how NFL teams communicate to the QB from the sidelines.  The advantage here is there would be no more signs to steal from the catcher.  Disadvantage is the infielders would not know what was coming either.  3).  Longer term solution is to allow electronic communication to all players.  Not sure how to prevent teams from eaves dropping on this communication.  I think for football games, the NFL actually runs the electronic communications.  4).  Mandate a video delay from broadcaster of ~ 10 seconds.  

Under the current rules, what stops someone from sitting in CF with a binoculars and signalling the pitch with some object (hat, newspaper, etc).

Did that Fliers guy retire yet? I bet players hate him...anyway I don't think the Twins cheat because a Bomba is a Bomba and we never win the important games. I thought it was funny that Pete Rose said he at least did make his team cheat and just liked to bet $.

We have come to point with technology what will game evolve into because video taping and real time communication is going to make it impossible to to monitor. What is to pervent even single player from hiring people to communicating this information to him when he's at bat during a game. All it would take wifi transmitter to cell phone to one in the crowd to receive images off in field camera's and that person again communicating it to a player via cell phone again that would alert him to the pitch he's receiving. Because of this we have had slowing of the game to try to just pervent sign stealing. Is it that we need to add more technology so we get away from physical form of communication or is that we ban baseball from using any video replay which i find almost impossible in this day with current technology. I have to believe if the game is going to continue we need to come to some form ethical behavior that can't be crossed. The under lying problem is money now involved in the game and attitude win at all costs even when you know youre cheating. I believe this has been not limited to to Boston and Houston and i am willing to bet this has been done by number of other clubs over the years with some sort of cheating. Even clubs may have not know of cheating but it was done by individual players getting around the rules because amount of money involved for success may have paid off in great returns. Just like we had with drugs and steroids era the returns were way more than costs.

Baseball is going to need to sit down as industry work out how they can keep integrity of the game. This is just not management and owners but it also includes the players and the agents, and also the media in coming up with plan to restore the faith in the game or it will die as sport and business because of this drive to win at all costs. Yes we need to compete but it has to be done fairly and follow set of rules the players,ownership and fans all can agree upon. To do this i think that penalties have to be very strict and almost like death sentence for offending parties this includes players, managenent, and owners. Like if your caught cheating finds strips of both of accomplishments as welll as money you have made. For players there would be automatic life bans and fines that represent percentage of career earnings from the game. Management same again lifetime ban and significant fines to be paid. Ownership this should be special here with large fines and lifetime bans with ultimate punishment that they have to sell club for what they purchased the club for. All these measures seem high but if punishment is not set high there will be no policing by various clubs with this risks are so high that nobody would want to even think about cheating and each of these groups would be monitoring each other because of risk of punishment. These are my thoughts on this latest cheating scandal this is in my mind only way to clean this game up in the future.

TL:DR

Possible solutions going forward.  1).  Eliminate teams ability to review plays before issuing a  challenge.  The video feeds for this were an enabling feature for the cheating.  2).  Allow pitchers and catchers to communicate electronically.  The example here is how NFL teams communicate to the QB from the sidelines.  The advantage here is there would be no more signs to steal from the catcher.  Disadvantage is the infielders would not know what was coming either.  3).  Longer term solution is to allow electronic communication to all players.  Not sure how to prevent teams from eaves dropping on this communication.  I think for football games, the NFL actually runs the electronic communications.  4).  Mandate a video delay from broadcaster of ~ 10 seconds.  

 

Under the current rules, what stops someone from sitting in CF with a binoculars and signalling the pitch with some object (hat, newspaper, etc).

I like these solutions. The only one that would likely work for this season is #4. An alternative might be to blur out the catcher's signal as they do for "indecent" exposure on newscasts. That would keep Dick & Bert in the dark, which might actually be a good thing. Broadcasters of American football somehow manage to do the job without knowing what play is being called.

One player using PEDs is completely different than an entire offense using video to determine pitch-selection. It's like robbing a 7-11 with a squirt gun vs. robbing the Federal Reserve with a tank. Anyone who's raving about PEDs to defend the Astros massive cheating conspiracy is completely off their rocker.

The team should be banned from competition for 2 years, but that won't happen because it'll violate something on the Players' Union side. But without a doubt, the 2017 title should be vacated, period. At least take their title and those banners, it's absolutely shameful and a disgrace to the sport of baseball.

They cheated! Find the guilty parties and suspend them. Cheating also prohibits HOF consideration.

 I can't see how someone can argue that this is worse for the game than steroids were.

 

I caught a bit of an interview with a player or former player, don't know who, on the SirusXM MLB channel the other day. He stated that the advantage gained by knowing which pitch was coming during half the games of a season is far greater than the advantage gained by using PED's.

I worked in football tracking, graphing plays throughout the first half of the game, then trying to predict some moves in the second half. Keeping a file to look at again if you play that team.

In baseball, some people have always tried to steal signs. I thought it got pretty difficult when a team had decided to use up to five "tells" in a game to reflect what the sign structure wa for that inning. A sign that the sign following will tell you when the next sign is comng (first, second or third). You always had the guy in centerfield with the hat or glasses. Always the coach on the top of the dugout steps. Looking for that one-up easy that might make a game easier. Now you have after-the-game video of every pitch and every swing and people who have a job charting the whole mess and figuring out odds of throw and swing. That it was reduced to banging on a trashcan lid is beyond my comprehension. But, yes...it has to be addressed. 

People will push for advantage, especially when money and fame and glory is involved, or so it seems. Like someone said, we reward people who have served out suspensions, giving them a second (and maybe even third) chance to continue to score a payday. The question always is, does the organization get to suffer when a play goes under suspension, yes. We saw it with the Twins at the tail end of 2019. Should a team suffer that they don't have their act together monitoring their players? I would say yes. With so many people eligible and wanting, one mistake might be enoygh to be a career ender. You learn by punishent, or suppose we are told, and having to make changes to your life and fighting the stigma for the rest of your life.