Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - 69 | Astros Punishment Gut Reaction!!

Episode Date: January 13, 2020

Luckily we were in the same airbnb in LA with the mics ready to go. We went live as soon as we saw the Rosenthal tweet. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

It is officially almost over, guys. Ken Rosenthal tweeted out breaking per sources. MLB's penalties for Astros include one year suspension for GM Jeff Loonow and manager AJ Hinch. One, or losses of first and second round draft picks in both 2020 and 21, a fine of $5 million. There's the full story in the athletic. I can click and skim it. This is all I've read. There were some follow tweets, but Jake and I haven't said a word of this.

No. To each other. We just saw the tweets and let's go live. We didn't want to give away our natural reactions. So we wanted to do them live. So Jake, what's your reaction? What's your reaction, dude? If this came out a month ago,

I would have been like, oh, damn. Okay. They fucking, they went big. Okay. As the longer it let I, the longer they allowed me to stew on it. Yeah. The more I was like, fuck, dude. Like, nothing else has come about out about other teams as that includes installing your own camera in centerfield.

We had the Red Sox. We had the, the Yankees, replay center room. We've gone over that completely different animal. So no other team has been lumped into this. Right. That might be strategic because they don't want. a lot of teams in there. The more I stood on it, the more I was like, dude, fuck this.

The more people talk to me and I saw pictures and I saw like straight confirmation that they set up their own camera in center field to get exactly the pitch. The more I was like, we need, we need something big. This is big. So in the end, I am happy. I think it's satisfying enough because it confirms they did it. Yeah. It confirms they got caught.

It confirms that it was top down, not player run. This was instilled in the organization. So I think I'm satisfied with this. Yeah, I think the first takeaway is a level of satisfaction. Like if you're a Houston fan, you can't fight this anymore. No. You have two giant suspensions. It's over.

You lost the war. Here's my deal. And those draft picks and, I mean, the $5 million, dollar fine. That's nothing. That's nothing. Nothing. To an organization that size, that's nothing. The first and second round picks, like, there will be an effect of that in about five years, but that's how baseball works. Yeah.

No, I mean, we know how valuable picks are. Here's my biggest gripe with the whole thing. I needed a differentiation between Lunau, Luno, Loonow, and Hinch. I need to know who was doing, who led the way on it. Because we assumed it was Lou Now, because they created that whole fake department. But them having an equal punishment doesn't sit well with me. And that's, it's reaching a little bit, but also at the same time, like there needs to be a fall man. Not like, hey, the group did it.

Like I think one of those two people, because like you said, make their own cameras. and what they did is so much more than everyone else that I think there needed to be a full out fall man whether that was Hinch or Loonow. And I don't feel that. Loonow should get more than Hinch. That's what we've assumed. Unless they're trying to tell us that Hinch was very much involved in this.

Hinch went from looking like one of the nicest guys in Major League Baseball to a total smug jerk. Fair? I mean, I never thought of him as like an, A nice guy, baseball. He had a reputation as being very nice. Yeah, he was a lot of managers are. But now you know.

Yeah. And he comes off like such a jerk. Can you make a full Hinch highlight reel? No, but someone else do that for me and I'll share it. And I'll say, you did a great job. Just all of the quotes that Hinch said about, you know, the whistling's ridiculous and all this is ridiculous. That's maybe the most frustrating part.

Tobman I read got blackballed. I mean. he should have him blackballed on multiple levels. I mean, he should be blackballed from everything besides opening up his own car wash. And even then, watch him closely. Yeah, I'm okay with the car wash. Just watch closely, is that what I'm saying. Everyone for the rest of his life will watch him closely,

only because he's a bad guy. Sexist bad guy. Oh, come on. I'm trying to read the athletic article. One problem I have with the athletic is when I click your articles from Twitter, I've got to go through like five different hoops to read it. subscribe to you. Make it easier for me. I just want to, I just, I'm searching for a line.

Looks like a timeline. Yeah. Discipline for core will be determined after baseball completes its investigation of the Red Sox for separate sign stealing allegations. Oh, okay. So whole other. Yeah, core is tied into both. Yeah, it's not a good look.

The suspension of Hinch is the longest for a manager since Pete Rose. Okay, so that is substantial. If you compare it to pass things. People admitted, witnesses came forward said they had the cameras. Like, we have proof. We have a final thing. MLB investigated this. It's true.

If you weren't on that side of things, you kind of have a strange brain, or you're a Houston Texans fan who is just in denial. You don't have to be a Texans fan. It starts with the Astros, and then you probably like the Texans. But you're also having a bad day because the Texans blew lead yesterday.

Houston Rockets can't do anything in the playoffs. The Astros routed the feed from center field camera to a screen situated in the tunnel. We saw that. We saw them breaking it down after game two, a game three of the World Series when they were going to be back the very next day. If that wasn't an illegal,

an illegal camera situation, there's no need to break it down. Yeah. Before, for a game that's going to be there. Just leave it up. But the fact they were breaking it down nobody loves setting up a TV every day. Ding, Brady.

Yeah. It's a lot of shady shit, man. Do the ding shady noise again. Ding shady. Wow. That's nice. You've been working on that. Yeah.

So who's the manager of the Astros? Yeah, that's a good question. Who's the GM? I don't know. I mean, I'm assuming the bench coach is going to slide up. I'm assuming the assistant GM's going to slide up. When does the year start and stop? I'm guessing before spring training.

So Hinch can get spring training next year. I don't know. Are they no appeal? Do we know anything about that yet? I don't think so. If they do, that'd be kind of hilarious, to be honest. I don't know, man. I kind of wanted a separation between Hinch and Luno,

and I don't have that. And I think the other thing at the end of the day, and I don't know if this is what the YouTubers walk away with being salty, like, I don't know, one year suspension, these guys are going to come back to their jobs, and they still have rings. Like Hinch is still a World Series winning manager. Loonow is still a World Series winning GM.

I knew they weren't going to... They definitely have asterisks. I knew they weren't going to... take the the ring or the world series away because 50 years from now right you know our kids or their kids look at you know and they see that and they're like wait what happened and at and mb doesn't want a permanent scar on its record it's so into the history books same reason they don't do asterisks for the steroids guys because they hope that all of us die and then that story doesn't get told on yeah and they're like well look how good berry bonds was and there's not one person alive to be like

well, they want their records to stay clear of that. So I knew that wasn't going to happen. I do think if you're an Astros fan, you can't really brag about anything. You can, but you're just going to have to be so obnoxious that people won't want to talk to you at all. No, I mean, it's not something, yeah, it shouldn't be a source of pride. It sucks. I did see one of the first replies to my tweets was like, wow, nothing for the players. and no, and I think you and I are in the same stance in this, that if you're a player and you come up

through the organization, and it's kind of all you know, A, you're not asking a ton of questions, B, your job is to play well and do your best, and baseball's the toughest sport in the world to play. So, yeah, if you're coming up and you hear, oh, yeah, our guys are really good at picking up on signs. If there's an off-speed pitch coming, you know, and you hear the best. bang, that means it's off speed. You're going to use that information. So I'm pretty cool on nothing for the players.

Yeah. I mean, they just have to deal with this forever. Forever. All right. So in Bob Manfred's, what's the term? In his words. Press release. Press release.

He said this about the Astros. But while no one can dispute that Luneau's baseball operations department is an industry leader in its analytics, it is very clear to me that the culture of the baseball operations department manifesting itself in the way its employees are treated, its relations with other clubs, and its relations with the media and external stakeholders has been very problematic.

So basically saying, yeah, they might be good at analytics, but they're real fucking assholes to everyone. Yeah. The entire league. Hey, maybe this kind of ringed. true to why people were so ready to be like, fuck the Astros everywhere. Yeah.

Everywhere I talk to, players, people in other media, like winter meetings, everyone is ready to be like, fuck those guys. And maybe it's because Manfred says right here that the culture of the Astros in the way they entreat their own employees, their relations with clubs, relations with media, external stakeholders has been very problematic. Well, no, it's pretty fun for me about this. At first, I hated that quote because he opens up with a comment. And it's like, hey, we're past that.

Yeah, the team ended up putting out a pretty crazy project after tanking, a lot of high draft picks and everything else they did. But they severely cheated. But the second time you read that through, I was thinking about it of all the player interviews that the Astros have done and been like, we tried really hard and did good. It's like, that's not the problem. I need you to know that. And the second time you read it, that's how I had Manfred saying it, like,

Yeah, you guys did do some okay analytic stuff. Everything else was a nightmare. Fuck them, man. Yeah, got a World Series. Got a ring. It worked. It worked.

They won a World Series. That memory of them celebrating is a memory they have. So like, you know what? This puts future managers in a tough spot. Okay. Because if you're a. player, right? Right.

Try this. What's to stop players from banding together and like rigging something with the dudes in the bullpen? The only thing that they're hoping now is the GM and the manager of the baseball team like are the bad guy in the clubhouse. Like they have to like can't turn a blind eye. So. Yeah.

Um, a lot has to go on to do that. You are kind of right and that is an interesting. spin for the players like the players players should have been penalized to a degree so that they that would have been interesting like the players should have been punished so that if this does happen again or if they scheme their own thing that they're afraid of it and that's kind of my lunau hinge thing is that I wanted when this punishment hit I wanted to say well we'll never see that in baseball again and you can't say that with this punishment doesn't feel that feels talk sports radioe but seriously like it doesn't feel like this puts an end if you have a genuine chance to win

the world series and you know the worst case is a year ban for your coach what if you hate your coach yeah just bring a GoPro to the outfield and start philipa haven't been there um so yeah i oh they confirmed that they used it in the post season let's fucking go this is what i want i just want confirmation pass and tweet of all the things in mleby's investigate and Rob Manfred's nine-page letter. I want to read that. This might be the most damning. The Astros, who won the 2017 World Series,

used their signed-stealing scheme in that post-season. You motherfuckers. This is Rob Manfred's words. Notwithstanding the publicity surrounding the Red Sox incident and the September 15th memorandum that I sent to all clubs, the Astros continued to both utilize the replay review room and the monitor located next to the dugout to decode signs,

for the remainder of the regular season and throughout the postseason. That makes me happy. Kind of in a weird way. Oh, because I have asked. That makes you happy for the 5% of annoying teenagers Astros fans on the internet

who aren't going to listen to you say it anyway. So I think happy is going to be the weird word. They'll just tweet anger at me, but I can be like, you fuckers use it in the post season confirmed. Yeah. And we all knew that. And guess what?

I've had it confirmed that the buzzing band-aids were true from like 10, different people. Wow. Probably five. Probably five. Went from 10 to 10 different and not in the same circle. Like 10 different people are like that's definitely fucking true.

So I'm sure they found that out as well. It sucks, man. And I won't do my jakey emotional full baseball speech. But again, we'll see what comes out with the Red Sox. That's a different situation overall. But Cora is heavily linked to both. And yeah, we are still talking about two years of tainted world series and tainted

MVP's alt-tube won the MVP in 2017 like he should have should okay i was going to get myself in a little trouble but he should have that taken away he should right when we're talking about actual player punishment like how can he be awarded the MVP that year when they were clearly cheating i don't know man the whole thing's kind of fucking weird. Like, we're all going to have our own personal mental asterisk, but I don't know. I am leaning. And again, yeah, we are Yankee fans. We've admitted that many times. It does feel a little light. You're, you are right. And we both had kind of this same emotion that you can, there's no argument. The Astros cheated. They got one of the larger punishments in baseball history.

it still feels a little lackluster. Like, the MLB needed to give one jab. And that jab either need to be a suspension or like pull Altuve's MVP or something like that. And there's not that. It's a big suspension for the history of baseball. Carry this for 30 seconds. All right, see you, Jim.

All right. So I'm a Libra. No, I just think, I don't know. I really like that players thing that, just stumbled into with the what's stopping them because i i i just gave my players no punishment speech i kind of what okay that is my yankees bias that i only want the ltuvea mvp gone because it i think by default it would go to judge a little bit but no the the players i guess there is going to be a mental asterisk we're all baseball fans and when we're watching this we know you know when we

watch George Springer, Altova, Correa, those guys, we are going to look at them differently. And I guess that is supposed to be enough punishment. I don't know. Oh, he's running back. Oh, sticker under your chin. Wow. Donning it. Got it.

Or the YouTube crowd. Got it. It's kind of small. Bang. Because this is, this was a return. I have seen the others and I have. Have discovered that this fight is not worth fighting. Yeah, that's good.

Look at you. They did. It's official. It's confirmed. Small sweatshirt because this was a return. We're in California right now. So everything on your screen is currently confirmed. Even smaller.

Oh, we've got layers. Oh, wow. These are going to be given away tonight to one lucky fan. Someone who comes out to our live show. We'll get a game. worn shirt. Is that a medium? I don't know.

What is it? Stickers still on your chin again. It's a small. Yeah. It feels small. The last time you put on a small shirt. I don't know. Well, yeah, it's official.

Shop.jomboimedia.com. Go pick them up because we're just, they cheated, man. Yeah. Pretty bad. Like, no real hiding from it. They didn't skirt the rules. They clear-cut.

cheated to give them an advantage in a way no other team has done in the history of baseball. Yeah. Is Kor are going to get like a half year suspension or something? I don't know. I mean, he's with the stroes. He's tied to the socks. Who knows? Okay.

All right. I think that's good. We got all our thoughts out. Obviously, this was gut reaction. There will be more that comes from this. And we will be probably talking about a live show tonight in Santa Monica. Yeah. come by if you're around.

But listen to Talking Baseball on Talking Baseball. Any podcast app. And then we have its own channel, Talking Baseball Channel, that where all our full episodes go. So tune in because we'll be discussing the rest of this probably. And Jesus, both of y'all sound like cry babies. Nailed it. Why?

Nailed it. Who's crying? We are jubilant, jovial. We're excited that MLB actually threw down some punishments. It's a solid punishment. It's six out of ten. I got, I like that. It confirmed.

It's like a B minus. I'll go B. Okay. I'll go B. That's pretty good. Every team does this. Oh, no, they don't. They quite literally don't.

No, every team does not do not do this. That's the whole situation. That's the whole situation. That's everything that's going on. Yeah. One team. The other 29 did not do this.

And they don't because it's illegal. We've talked. So, yeah, like maybe a handful have a, tried ways to go a little farther is what we've confirmed. I heard another team might have installed cameras. There is a reason people went out of their way to point the finger at the Astros. This isn't all around the leak.

And if you think that, you're just straight up, not caught up and not informed. Or an Astros fan. Even then, they've been not reading any news because they think it's all garbage. If you think... Back against the wall. Yeah. You're just scratching and clawed. Scratch and claw.

Yeah. Yeah. All right. Cool. Thanks for hanging out with us. Tune into future episodes. Like you said, we'll probably have more thoughts on this. Cool stuff coming.

Jack Flaherty. Jack Flaherty tonight. We'll ask him about it. Maybe. Maybe. See ya.