I am not upset or concerned that everybody, including the Astros were cheating. Since the league has long given it's tacit consent, so be it. However, if you want to to talk about reality, here it is. The league sent a letter to every team, telling them to end a particular type of cheating. They let everybody know that any future incidents would be dealt with harshly. And the thing that really pisses me off is that apparently the team owner specifically told the general manager that if they were doing it, make sure they stopped. Whoever knew about it, chose to ignore it, for whatever reason. Just my opinion, and maybe I am wrong, but I believe this was not some well kept secret, but common knowledge throughout the organization. So with all the intelligent people employed, they could not see the handwriting, and decide to just continue as normal. And as a result, they were hammered. Needlessly. Un-surprisingly. 4 draft picks down the drain. And yes, I blame Luhnow, first and foremost. You can whine about other teams. Maybe there are plenty of them still doing it. If so, my hope is that they get hammered progressively worse. My guess is that they learned their lesson from the Astros, and have changed the way they cheat to get around the letter, which did not address all cheating, by the way. But if you got proof or information I am not aware of, bring it. You can say but, but the Red Sox... Okay they should have been hammered and were not. That just shows Manfred is a complete and total f***wad, but it still doesn't exonerate the Astros. Trying to excuse their stupidity is ignoring reality. Trying to justify their actions after receiving a warning, indicates a lack of character to me. (Only for the criminally stupid among us, hypocrisy is the practice of engaging in the same behavior or activity for which one criticizes another or the practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one's own behavior does not conform.) There are plenty of people that are pissed that the Astros cheated. They have a myriad of reasons for their beliefs. To claim that their opinions don't deserve to be valued is the epitome of asinine. After reading your opinion, I think you really should set me to ignore
I don't set people to ignore simply because I disagree with them. When it comes to sign stealing, even if you don't know enough about the game to know its something that has been going on since the very beginning, I'd expect you to know that it's something the entire league was doing in one form or the other. Saying the Astros "cheated" by doing essentially the same thing every team was doing is merely ridiculous pearl clutching imo. Blaming the GM for the league's hypocritical response is even more ridiculous.
So....why is it an either/or scenario? Can't folks both accept the fact there has been wide spread cheating and be upset that the Astros did it?
It just seems odd to be upset that the Astros dis what everyone else was doing. The reason the baseball writers want you to be upset is solely the fact that the Astros beat out larger market teams while doing what they were doing. If the Yankees win, there's no scandal at all despite the fact the Astros merely adopted the Yankees sign stealing system when Beltran re-joined the Astros. A lot of people are only upset because they've been told to be upset.
In many ways it was the same with steroids, when the approved people were benefitting, it was swept under the rug and celebrated. The league and the media loved McGwire and Sosa, they hated Bonds though. Once Bonds started benefitting from what the league was celebrating, it became a scandal and the writers switched from praise to scorn and a great number of fans went along with it, adopting whatever opinion they were told to have at the time
Same deal again, lack of nuance, needlessly pushing opinions to the extreme. I didn’t call his tenure “average”. I have consistently maintained that he was merely “good”, not “great”. Part of the reason for that is that during his tenure his teams won an average of 82 games per season, which is an observable fact. You talk about how awesome he is (“he traded for 3 hall of famers!”), then toss in something like “sure, he traded for a known wifebeater” as if it’s an aside. Trading for a ****ing wifebeating piece of **** is EXACTLY the kind of thing that takes a guy down from “great” to “good”. I don’t think I’ve seen a single poster on this site EVER state that Luhnow was an “average” GM. Stating the fact that he was .500 during his tenure as part of the evidence that he was “good” not “great” is NOT saying he was average on the whole. So to try to characterize my or anyone’s else’s opinion that way is totally disingenuous.
I was on my phone so my phone was auto correcting. How many games in the WS did the Astros win before Luhnow.
I'm upset about it and didn't need the media to tell me to be. I don't care about how widespread it is/was. I don't care that it was likely statistically insignificant. Fact is they did it and I don't like it.
First, citing his record without the context that he inherited a team that was the WORST in franchise history is insincere, so is the fact that he left a team that was set up to win 90+ games for 5 years also shows a lack of context. As for Osuna, based on your criteria it is fair to say that Brian Cashman and Theo Epstein are only “good” general managers. Please tell whom you consider great general managers.
People can certainly be upset that the Astros cheated, as long as it is understood that it was wide spread and rampant. I will say I find it odd fans are upset as baseball has long had consistent and deep rooted cheating. I saw it first hand working for the club and a few players I played against in HS and college went to the big leagues and have discussed it with me as well. The reality is the Astros were cheating above and beyond the sign stealing... so were the Dodgers (who still cheat), the Red Sox and Yankees... and likely every team. The Dodgers Buehler was cheating deep into the playoffs last year.... Those Cardinals teams that were so good had guys like Jeff Suppan cheating... LaRussa cheated... those A’s and Yankees team were full of steroid users and it wasn’t a secret. The Astros in the 80’s had pitchers that cheated (Niekro, Scott), the Astros teams in the 90’s had players like Caminiti and Gonzalez and Finley that cheated and pitchers like Duckworth... the teams in the 2000’s were full of cheating as well. Hell if you believe what the Astros own players say in private, the man that turned the Astros in for cheating was cheating himself. I see Cole get signed by a team in the Yankees that feigned anger... I see the Dodgers spend huge money for a starting pitcher everyone knows is cheating... the Red Sox hire a cheater manager and bring him back... what is cheater Beltran up to? Willie Mays and Hank Aaron and Mickey Mantle were wired to their gills every game from meth. So were some Astros and a Hall of Famer in Baltimore. The best offensive player in 80 years cheated.... so did the best pitcher... the greatest hitter of all time (Cobb) cheated and arguably the best SS to ever live. So I understand your position, and respect it. I just personally have seen and heard enough to know that cheating is part of the game... to the extent that a team not cheating puts them at a disadvantage.
Love Abreu's slider. He's got to be able to throw it for strikes. Astros have a ton of young pitchers with stuff. Hoping he's one of the ones that finds a way to command it. Garcia...His stuff is a lot like the 2020 Urquidy except he also has a cutter. Urquidy attacks hitters in the zone. Garcia goes for swing and misses more. Though, it would be helpful if Garcia had more command of his fastball and could keep it up in the zone more. His extensive repertoire looks like a starter. His command..not so much.
The unfortunate and infuriating thing is that MLB essentially "stopped" the sign stealing investigation with Houston. The Red Sox got a slap on the wrist. MLB did not want it known how widespread things were/are.
Strom was praising Abreu the last couple years. I want to say last Spring he said he already had the makings of a #1 or #2 starter. Garcia is interesting, I agree with evaluation but I want to say that Goldstein thinks he may end up in the pen long term. I would really like to know the unvarnished truth about what Strom thinks of Whitley. He hasn’t always been terribly vocal on Whitley and has been critical reading between the lines with Whitley’s decision to change his mechanics initially and hasn’t been happy with his shape.
Agreed but it is a pattern in baseball and it is part of why I have just come to accept that cheating is part of the culture of the sport. The league office, the managers and general managers and players all knew of rampant steroid and PED use and purposely turned the other cheek. The league and every team has known that cheating by pitchers is incredibly common and unless someone is caught in a game, nothing is said or done. Look at LaRussa with the White Sox doing what the Astros did decades ago, and Bobby Thompson’s home run. It also puts tremendous pressure on players and managers to cheat to compete. It is just the way it is. I look at the Black Sox scandal and then read about how many other athletes were throwing games for money. Hack Wilson was deep deep in debt to the Chicago Mafia. So when I read or hear someone say “oh the Astros were sent a letter told to stop doing X” it rings hollow to me when every team is doing something similar or cheating in other ways. Having said that I understand people not liking it, I just believe context is lost. Also I have a disdain for those that seem to think that what the Astros did was some unique and solo event because it is simply absurd. It is the same as when Bill Clinton or Donald Trump are criticized for cheating on their spouses by Jesse Jackson or a certain Minister.... first Jackson and this minister were having children with their mistresses and second, JFK and Eisenhower and Bush Sr. and LBJ all cheated on their wives. We either need to be consistent with our disdain and elect better people or drop it.
I have not presented my opinion without listing what I think are both the positives and negatives of Luhnow’s tenure. I’m adding context, not removing it. Off the top of my head, Brian Sabean, Dayton Moore, and Pat Gillick were great GMs.
The reliever risk has to be command, the pitches were just moving in his brief stint, or he just throws harder in shorter stints making it more tantalizing to put him as a reliever. Though, I expect Click will try to have a deeper pen making the line between MoR and BoR starter and reliever blurry. There aren't many relievers with 4 pitches that have plus movement along with a cutter. Not sure how good the cutter is just yet, but it looks to have wiggle that makes it hard to barrel.
Because we became the poster boy of it unfortunately. We built a team in a way that upset the status quo and Luhnow became Icarus.
What? It mattered to the people who had the power to trash our name and make us fire the guy you worship and he still can't find a job. Just because we don't care does not mean it did not matter.
