The letter that MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred sent to New York Yankees general manager Brian Cashman in 2017 regarding a sign-stealing investigation was leaked on Tuesday and has the MLB world talking.
SNY obtained the letter, which details that Yankees players used their video replay room to try and identify sign sequences in an attempt to steal the opposing team’s signs. The Yankees were also found to be improperly using a dugout phone to relay information about the opposing team’s signs, which they were fined $100,000 for doing.
This is different from what the Houston Astros did in their infamous World Series run in 2017, where they were using the center field camera as well as trash cans to illegally steal what pitch was coming from the opposing pitcher.
The infamous Yankees Letter … is pretty much a nothing-burger. Says the Yankees used their replay room to decode catchers' signs and relay them to runners on second — which multiple teams were doing. Does not find they were illicitly using CF camera. @martinonyc had it first.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) April 26, 2022
While the Yankees did get condemned with a fine from Manfred and the MLB, this event occurred before Manfred said that future sign-stealing actions would be met with harsher punishments.
Many around the MLB world do feel that the Yankees should have been met with harsher punishments than what was given out.
THREAD: Let’s start with some facts.
The New York Yankees cheated.
The Boston Red Sox cheated.
The Houston Astros cheated.
All of them used technology in real time to steal signs. (1/9)
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) April 26, 2022
starting to feel like I'm going to turn into a person who tweets MLB LIED ABOUT THE YANKEES CHEATING AND NO ONE CARES a few times a week, because a shockingly minuscule number of national writers care that it happened, they're too busy handwaving the cheating
— Liz Roscher (@lizroscher) April 26, 2022
So the @Yankees were doing their own sign stealing. No kidding. It may stop the boo birds when the @astros are @yankeestadium Oh wait, it don't matter… the last time Altuve blasted a homer.
— LEN CANNON (@lencannonKHOU) April 26, 2022
Others feel that the Astros’ situation was far worse and that it should not be treated in the same category of cheating.
https://twitter.com/WillPresti/status/1519066309748826112
What the Houston Astros did in the sign stealing scandal is SIGNIFICANTLY worse than what the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees did.
I’m just telling you. Significantly worse.
— Vinnie Parise (@VinnieParise) April 26, 2022
It certainly makes you wonder why exactly the Yankees were so adamant that this letter didn’t get out if they knew that they did very little wrong. For everyone involved, it comes off as a very shady look for this to come out so many years after the initial investigation.
While the Astros seemingly did far more in their role of cheating, the Yankees certainly don’t come out of this looking clean for what they did.
[SNY, New York Post]
