[NY Times] Cardinals under FBI investigation for hacking Astros

If these allegations are true, I think the punishment needs to be severe. I'm thinking any players that they drafted or acquired using ill-gotten knowledge should become free agents that cannot re-sign with the Cardinals unless no team offers them more than their current contract.

This way they keep any bad picks and lose all the good ones. After that, maybe no draft picks for one year and then phase them back in over time - say bottom 3rd, bottom-2/3 rds only, then full picks over 3 years.

The punishment needs to be harsh such that there's no question that hacking in sports doesn't pay.

 

I'll never get over the Astros leaving baseball for the American League. I couldn't tell you their record. That's how "interested" I am in the Astros today. That doesn't mean I'll never go to another game. I'm sure I will, eventually. My nephew's still a big fan and would like me to drive down for a game. Minute Maid is still a beautiful park. My reason for posting, though, was due to this stunning scandal, and that it was the Astros who were hacked. They must be doing something right (excepting playing in the AL) to be a target good enough for people with the Cards to take the mind boggling risk of breaking into their system. Truly a trip!

 

This should land the Astros the 2nd overall pick + The Cards 1st rd pick as compensation/retribution in next years draft

 

I get the feeling this will turn out to be nothing or get buried from a criminal case perspective. Someone will still have to prosecute and harm still needs to be shown so if only trade speculation and scouting reports were taken, that might not rise to the level of criminal harm.

However, baseball will should and will smack the Cardinals not for the embarrassment of the investigation but the fact they leaked information stolen to sites like Deadspin. I can't imagine teams don't pull some sort of shenanigans when trying to gain a competitive advantage but leaking info verbatim is a big leap over using an agent or reporter as a mouthpiece for a story favorable to your team.

 

Hmm... within your post you both down-play whether or not they could "prove" something criminal... and then you highlight a big part of what will be easily proven as "criminal".

Ashby says "intriguing".

 

How about we just beat their asses in the World Series this year?

That'd be a good punishment.

 

Lol hahaha this. In Jeff Luhnow I trust...It makes me wonder if Luhnow didn't change his passwords to bait the Cardinals...For some reason I wouldn't be shock if the Cardinals 1st rd pick goes to the Astros as compensation due to a compepetive advantage.

 

*competitive

 

I would be incredibly surprised if MLB offers any compensation to the Astros. It seems the Astros would have a legal means via a lawsuit, but other than that possibility, I don't expect any compensation.

What did the NFL give the Colts?

 

My guess is that the league offers something to the Astros so that there aren't any lawsuits.

I don't think this analogy fits. It'd be more similar if the Pats tampered with the Colts footballs or other equipment, or did something exclusively against the Colts that violated federal law. I'd also suspect something else might have been done had the score not been 41-7 or whatever it was. The Pats would have (and probably did) do that to every team. The Cardinals targeted one team either to gain competitive knowledge or out of spite. Either way, it's not the same as using deflated footballs, IMO.

 

Definitely this. The MLB needs to take action to make sure this doesn't happen again. The commissioner's main priority, I think, is deterrence.

Like bobrek says, the Astros' compensation could come through a civil lawsuit after the conclusion of any criminal prosecutions. If this all gets pegged on some low-level employees though, I doubt the Astros bother with a civil suit. No point dealing with the lawsuit if it only results in a judgment against a couple of regular guys.

The most likely outcome, to me: FBI brings the hammer against Cards' employees, or organization, or both. MLB levies a massive fine against the Cards--I'm not sure if they can touch the draft picks, since those are governed by the CBA. The Astros don't receive any real compensation, but happily applaud the outcome from the sidelines and take their PR victory lap.

 

MLB could/should definitely suspend/ban all current front office members of the Cardinals.

That in and of itself could be enough punishment... we all know how difficult it is to rebound once established in-place systems are upheaved.

Then again, by doing that... the cardinals owners may just make a big push to poach all the other members of the Astros front office (Elias, Mejdal, Fast, etc.), and offer them all more money/bigger titles to rebuild their banned one.

Hence, that would make us weaker.

So, no banning their front office!

 

Criminal in the eyes of the Feds and MLB are different things. A federal prosecutor can be presented the evidence and decide not to prosecute. MLB can be presented the same evidence and come down hard on the Cardinals and people who hacked the Astros.

The information they accessed is about baseball and federal prosecutors have better things to do than pursue criminal proceedings if they know MLB will deliver a sufficient enough punishment. Baseball would deliver that punishment not for the hacking itself but because the hackers went public with the information. If deadspin never gets any of the hacked data, does anyone ever know this occurred? The Astros only admitted to be hacked until the leaked information hit the internet, not before.

 

The feds have already basically completed their investigation and found fault... we are only hearing about it now because its coming to a conclusion.

They illegally accessed another company's propriety information and disseminated it... there will be repercussions legally.

And of course it required to be publicized to be "known"... and if you read the article, you'd basically see that was the primary intent of the hackers (to embarrass Luhnow publicly... hence spreading the information).

 

So hypothetically if the Astros DID get to take the contract of any Cards player should it be Adam Wainwright or Yadier Molina?

 

Twitter that too MLB someone

 

Would certainly be Wacha or Carpenter, right? Younger, cheaper contracts.

 

Wacha