CommentsOUTSIDE THE BOX -The Houston Astros cheated, got caught, and got slapped on the wrists. No one is happy with the verdict, so now what? Play. It. Again.
If Major League Baseball really wants to fix this mess (and make a lot of $$$ doing it), they would demand the 2017 World Series be replayed in some form during spring training this year. Really.
CRIMINAL INTENT
In professional baseball, electronic “sign stealing” is a crime because trying to hit a ball coming at you 90 MPH+ is a guessing game. As a batter, knowing the ball’s angle, speed and approach before it’s thrown helps. A lot. Houston’s batting orders were all complicit in a cheating scheme, or in inside-baseball parlance, nine men out.
LA CITY COUNCIL’S 0–2 COUNT AT THE PLATE
The LA City Council recently made headlines demanding the Astros must be more severely punished. Bravo. If USC was stripped of its 2004 NCAA national football championship for “cheating,” then canceling the Astros’ World Series win is in the realm of possibilities.
Revoking Houston’s one and only Fall Classic title would leave a mark.
Was City Hall serious in saying the 2017 series should be handed to the Dodgers as restitution? That would be a whammy. And then charge the same penalty to the Red Sox for 2018? Double whammy! If so, while they are telling Houston we have a problem, they’re actually saying we don’t quite understand professional baseball, or why that’s a ridiculous ask. Perhaps someone downtown thought, hey let’s shoot for everything, and maybe go home happy with Houston being disqualified. Worst case: We’ve made a grandiose gesture of support in an election year. Ballgame.
Uh, no. The Astros are already lined up for abuse nationwide; shaming them unmercifully will become a thing. The Yankees will get a respite by being the second most hated team in Baseball. But just as USC eventually got over its drubbing, life will go on in Houston. In their minds: F-U LA! We’re firing some guys, giving up some draft picks and paying a pocket change fine. But we’re keeping our trophy, dammit! LA oughta know 30 years might go by before we win one again.
The Dodgers did not draw Houston for any 2020 season interleague games, so a well-worded, well-meaning, motion from councilman Paul Koretz is. . .meh. But when the Astros come to bat in front of 50,000 New Yorkers out for blood, that will get interesting.
THE CRAZY TALK
It’s a safe bet every MLB owner weighed into Baseball Commissioner Rob Mandel’s verdict and sentencing. There was probably enough sentiment this embarrassing episode should go away. Quietly. I think anyone “in the room” was in damage control mode and not thinking about how to make lemonade out of these lemons.
And there it is. Decided. Or is it? While Houston has begrudgingly pleaded guilty, they’re certainly not contrite, and the public’s parade of memes has begun. For sure, José Altuve’s 2019 ALCS game seven walk-off homer in Houston is under a microscope. . .in the Bronx. Has anyone else besides MLB looked into whether Houston was also swiping signs in the seven game 2017 American League Pennant games leading to that World Series? Just sayin'.
It ain’t over, folks.
MLB's decision just repositioned professional baseball a notch or two above World Wide Wrestling in terms of legitimacy, and while ESPN may disagree, the punishment does not fit the crime. Our national pastime needs a bit more justice doled out if it’s to be taken seriously in the 21st century.
The 2017 World Series team rosters could, more or less, be reconstituted in an effort set the baseball world right again. We know the starting pitchers, batting orders and the field positions, and that’s key to the equity of it all. They must start the replay exactly the way they played it the first time. After that whatever happens, happens.
THE SPRING FEVER PITCH
During spring training, nothing significant besides injury really happens that carries into the regular season. Many professional sports, most notably soccer, pulls together rosters of players across different franchises to coalesce national teams, e.g., a World Cup or the Olympics. The players dispersed around the league by trade or free agency -- or those who hung up their cleats -- since 2017 could easily be called to do this. Why would they? Money.
BY THE NUMBERS
Some would argue just replay game 7, and that approach has merit, but every “next game” in the post season is strategized based on the one before it, specifically the pitching rotation. Knowing this, here’s some scenarios:
Redo a best-of-seven. Because.
Redo a best-of-five. The 2017 Series was tied 1-1 before moving to Minute Maid Park’s den of thieves. Pick it up from there.
Redo a best-of-three. While we may never know exactly what shenanigans the Astros pulled in Dodger Stadium, we do know three games were played in Houston. Let’s call them the “games of sin” that need to be cleansed.
Play one game. The Dodgers did win a game in Houston. The Astros may have been fools to employ a signaling system that included banging trashcans, but that system was not foolproof. The series went seven, but the math supporting one game also pencils out. However, the profit motive of multiple games could be more enticing to the 30 major league teams weighing in on the decision.
As more details surface -- say Band-Aid buzzers -- MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred can reconsider due to “overwhelming pressure” from everyone (except Houston). While at the same time enshrining him into the annals of baseball history. Not as a go-along-to-get-along stooge, but as the innovative out of the box thinker who blew up baseball.
Look Manfred, someone will play you in the movie, so you’ve got to be thinking about how to get your character from chump (right now) to champ by doing something more (real soon).
If Astros’ owner, Jim Crane, was told you could either be stripped of your first and only World Series victory or replay some games -- this time legit -- I think he would kick and scream but choose the latter. If Crane digs in his cowboy boots, remind him every Russian athlete has been banned from competition for. . . INSTITUTIONAL CHEATING.
Even before the ceremonial first pitch gets thrown out a replay would be “one for the ages,” regardless of the outcome, not to mention putting a rocket under the public’s interest in Baseball. And that’s good for the whole team of MLB owners. C’mon fellas, it’s not like there isn’t money to be made.
What about the players? Would any balk at this? It's fairly certain the Dodger would be game, especially Yu Darvish and Clayton Kershaw. The Astros would need a little convincing that they need to win their honor back, or if push comes to shove, face being permanently banned from The Game.
See also: Eight Men Out. But if you’re one of Houston’s hall of fame contenders, you’ve gotta know you’re paying some freight over this when your HOF balloting time comes. See also: Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds. Play ball.
Yes, this all sounds nutty. But here we are in a new decade, in a new century, and in uncharted waters as far as what goes beyond baseball’s pale and what to do about it. It’s insane Pete Rose is banned from Baseball for life for making side bets, and the entire Houston Astros organization skates on institutional theft perpetrated by its players AND management. Say it ain’t so.
The 1919 “Black Sox” didn’t have a championship title to be stripped of, so every player involved in throwing that series got bounced. In hindsight, lifetime suspension was a tabula rasa move. Imagine any of them taking the field on opening day in 1920! That decision was, as they say, “good for Baseball.” As it stands in 2020, cheating to lose the series has proven to be way more egregious than cheating to win it.
The MLB should put more thought to what might actually be good for baseball 100 years after Arnold Rothstein rigged the World Series, because you can’t be a little bit pregnant, nor a somewhat honest cheat.
(Mark F. Mauceri is the General Manager of Air Support Group; a content programming and marketing strategy firm. He lives in Los Feliz and is an occasional CityWatch contributor.) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.
