[NY Times] Cardinals under FBI investigation for hacking Astros

Right, that's the only logical reason how other employees weren't involved: he wanted to look like the smart guy.

 

If you were to take up mass murdering, should all your staff go to death row?

I think the point of contention is whether said rogue employee acted on behalf of his organization or on his own without the organizations knowledge. The league obviously concluded it was the later. I personally dont necessarily buy this. But again, its what can be proved, not what is suspected.

 

So did the FBI.

 

You're assuming the punishment was actually their top 2 picks. When MLB announced the settlement, they knew what picks STL had. If they wanted to take a 1st round pick, they could have in 2018. More likely, they intended to give 2 secondary picks. If STL had kept it's 1st round pick, they'd have just worded the punishment differently to be their 2nd and 3rd picks in this year's draft. MLB is not going to get hoodwinked into giving a lesser punishment due to a Cardinals FA signing. They aren't stupid.

 

You're arguing two different things....

We know why he hacked into the system; he had an antagonistic relationship with Luhnow and Mejdal, was jealous of the SI cover and wanted to sabotage their efforts. This was documented. There's no evidence the Cardinals were behind the hack.

In terms of leveraging the information... he doesn't keep it to himself: he repurposes it as his own and uses it to bolster his reputation. The Cardinals promoted him during the period he was hacking the Astros' system.

What you're arguing is that he told ranking officials within the Cardinals' organization that he had committed a crime with serious personal and professional implications and that they not only were OK with it but actively used the information he gleamed. There's absolutely no way that happened. He committed corporate espionage; the Cardinals would have never been complicit in that. Come on.

 

They were: they paid $2M (which is the maximum fine MLB can levy against a team) and forfeited two draft picks. I saw an article.... on Deadspin, maybe..... where they estimated, in terms of player value, that those two picks were worth approximately $15-20MM.

This was a significant punishment.

 

True

And the Cards benefited from his illegal activities and basically got a slap on the wrist.

 

You know the Cards weren't complicit how?

He said he shared the info with colleagues.

I wonder why judge Hughes didn't ask who those colleagues were?

 

So a 2nd/3rd rd picks are worth 10 million a piece?

In what world?

 

Taking 1st rd picks from the Cards for 5 years would've made a statement to other teams. It wouldn't have killed their org. It would've put them at a competitive disadvantage. Kinda like the competitive advantage they gained by hacking the Stros system for 3 yrs.

 

I'd love to see that article. Not a Deadspin fan, but I'm curious to see how that value was calculated. Seems far too generous at first glance.

The combined slot value for both picks is 1.8MM. So, that article is deducing that the draftees themselves are worth around 7.5MM each? I don't buy that; it seems like a huge stretch. Sure, draftees selected at slots #56 and #75 could give provide an excellent return, but I'd bet their expected return is a lot lower. The only way I could see that value actually working out is if you either: 1) nailed both picks (and the likelihood of that is low), or 2) draining both slots and inking a tough signee who also pays off (a la McCullers, but that again is also a huge risk).

 

On average, pick 54 produces ~1.5 wins over cost controlled years (I.e. Before FA)
On average, pick 75 produces ~1 win.
A win is worth about 8 million per WAR for free agents. 2.5 *8 million is 20 million. 20% deduction is needed for a near MLB prospect to convert to present day dollars. Should be about 25% for a draft pick ( rough guess without doing the math). 20 million becomes 15 million value. Minus the 1.8 million, and value for both picks combined should be around 13 million in present day dollars.

 

Forgot arbitration dollars. That should be roughly 3 million or about 2 million NPV. So say 10-11 million NPV back of the napkin calculation.

 

Its the way the system is set up. Did the Cardinals allow a laxed system, conducive to a rogue employee? When they were allowed an opportunity if they cautioned their employess of severity of Hacking or gathering information, they obviously did not meet certain standards. Even if the Cardinals were not aware, they did benefit from the information.

This is a reminder to all teams, they are responsible for the actions of their employees as it pertains to their business. A super competitive evironment is created, and it is the duty of the teams front office to put all employees on notice of what is illegal. Shoot, it is obvious the Cards ownership was upset Luhnow left, that negative energy in the club was what inclined Correa to behave so boldly. Did you ever see the "smartest guys in the room" documentary. People do dumb things when they are emboldend by an authorative figure.

Picture a guy trying to move up, who is a suck up, trying to impress his bosses, as they snicker that the guy whom they felt betrayed them. This scenario was what got the Cardinal a penalty of this magnitude. I read how the Cardinals owners son introduced Luhnow to his father to do the analytics; there was a feeling Luhnow owed it to the Cardinals organization. And the leaked information to embarrass the Astros all leans in this direction.

 

That's... ridiculous.

And the Cardinals were punished, given a maximum fine while losing two valuable assets.

Are you suggesting Correa didn't know it was illegal and that that's the Cardinals' fault?... I guarantee you a team that values the draft as much as St. Louis isn't viewing this as getting off easy.

What? That doesn't even make sense. At the end of the day, the Cardinals are ultimately responsible for the actions of their employees and that's why they were penalized. But the Cardinals were not otherwise implicated during the investigation; stop trying to play armchair conspiracy theorist.

 

in the corporate world, CEO' are held accountable for their rogue employees. They get heavy fines and jail time. A manager and company as a whole will be liable for sexual harrasment, or other misconduct by their employees. There is a reason a lot of us get a sexual harrasment class every 2 years, cyber security classes, confidentiality records, etc. Sometimes common sense is out the window, hey i agree with you, it was a rogue employee; should have stopped there. But this is a part of the work the litigation in courts have laid out the groundwork...

So based on what happens to businesses in the corporate world, and Professional teams being a part of a billion dollar industry, then the punishment was fitting.

 

Can you point to a CEO that was jailed for the actions of a rogue employee? Did you just make that up?

 

naivety, denial, professional apologists .....

 

Ken Lay was going to get jail time before he passed away. If you are a corporate officer, you can be held liable for your employees actions if you don't do your due diligence.