It really is insanity. Houston finally gets a dynasty-worthy team and this kind of thing happens. Life of a Houston sports fan, I guess.
I had known about the long suspension for Hinch and Luhnow for sometime and I knew they expected a year. So when that broke it didn't phase me. I had also heard from someone in the Astros that Crane had been speaking to the commissioner quite a bit on his own and there was some growing concern there would be pressure to get rid of Luhnow from inside baseball. Still, I expected Luhnow to keep his job. So when that broke I disengaged some because the Astros had lost the finest GM in sports and someone that wanted the job for another 20 years. Then I received an email from someone that I trust a lot saying that Luhnow basically told people close to the situation that he was forced out by major league baseball. At that point I started paying attention again. We all know what guys like Passan and Olney and Law would say. However, the well connected local beat writers across the country, listening to them has been interesting. Bruce Levine went as far as to say that Luhnow wasn't going to be around long regardless of the sign stealing. That is a big deal to me....... so because Luhnow did not follow all the unwritten rules, he was going to be pushed out. All because he isn't part of the club.
ESPN: Punishments not enough, need more https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id...enes-houston-astros-sign-stealing-punishments No one has ever come close to mentioning these levels of punishments against the Patriots or Red Sox.. or projecting the level of outrage. Does no one actually see what's going on here? Media picking on a small market team for being too smart.
Luhnow got this punishment because he dared make the old guard of MLB look archaic and out of touch. He insulted them with his moves constantly working favorably. That notation by the commissioner admonishing Luhnow for how he treated people says all you need to know. Luhnow was arrogant and hence his truest offense to MLB. He made the Yankees the Astros B’ H’.... The message is clear, the Astros are meant to be filler, not the main dish of MLB. That’s what the Cardinals, Yankees, Dodgers, Red Sox are slated for.... And Crane told MLB and the powers that be, “nice screw job, may I have another”. Weak weak owner, he needed Luhnow, but didn’t deserve him. This wasn’t about cheating so much as admonishing Luhnow... “We got him, we got him!”, now it’s businesses back to normal in MLB, the sage is gone.
Crane firing Hinch and Lunhnow is done out of his own guilt. There had been allegations of sign stealing for a while. It’s obvious the Astros were not too sly in their approach, trash can banging and all. I find it hard to believe Crane was oblivious to all of this. Crane chicken doo doo that he is, his over reacting to compensate his own involvement. Crane didn’t build his empire by being oblivious to his business and managers. Shoot, MLB had done its investigation into sign stealing previously. Why didn’t they find anything then? They allowed the very popular Astros to milk it, ‘till baseball writers spoiled the Astros like sour milk.... And they became nauseating. Luhnow disturbed their MLB empire, and enough was enough. Crane cowardly adherence to baseball’s old guard, shows Crane is content being another stooge.
I just said this in another thread, but baseball needs to get rid of the hand signal system if they want to stop people being tempted to steal pitch signals. Give the pitchers and catchers some sort of other form of communication. Every team out there is trying to get some kind of edge somehow and to act like the Astros are the worst villains ever with a horrible cheating culture is just ****ing ridiculous. This whole thing is ridiculous to me. Some players were trying to steal pitch signs...so what. Pitchers and catchers are always cognizant of their signs getting stolen. The effectiveness was even questionable from the report and from how the use of it declined quickly.
When you hear about a criminal doing something bad aren’t there always people saying, “He’s was such a nice boy. He could never”?
It'd be a hell of a seminar at Sloan. Jeez, to piss the media off this badly...what did he do? Take away their passes to the free lunchroom buffet? @Nook 's recitation makes a lot of sense. It would take a general dislike of the Astros organization for things like Footer's vendetta against the hiring of Osuna to have gone on as long as it did, and get as much media sympathy.
At this point, the ire is so personal and so over the top that I am wondering whether some of its roots are political: that they lie in personal animus by coastal media members towards flyover denizens who culturally are thought to be very different than the people these writers live, work among, and whose kids go to private school with. Hell, they are likely Trump voters. At least in those writers' heads. I'm drawing a blank at other reasons why most of major sports media seems to be taking this so damned personally. OTOH, they came at Brady and Bellichek with forks and knives too, over a few things that were awfully picayune.
Radio ear piece in the catcher’s and pitcher’s ears and letting the coaches call the pitches. Pitcher can nod or shake head from mound like they do now. Hell, let all the fielder’s have something and they can make defensive adjustments from the dugout without signs. Give the batters pieces as well and you can call bunts, takes, and swing always from the dugout without the batter stepping out all the time. Can also call steals and hit and runs as well. Would probably speed up the game a ton as well.
Because we've been beating New York and LA in the postseason and since most of the media covers those team's they are bitter.
OK, I can see that for beat writers, maybe, though I think a lot of the RIVALRY! talk is just shtick, but these are ostensibly national baseball writers indulging in this over the top zealotry. Why would national writers care one way or another whether LA and NY win or lose, except as to it making a more interesting story for their customers?
If it works in football, it absolutely can work in baseball. If that is an end result of all of this, the game would have been changed forever... for the better.