Astros fire Hinch, GM after ban for cheating

Suspension for sign stealing leads owner to clean house

HOUSTON — The Astros’ sign-stealing scandal cost manager AJ Hinch and general manager Jeff Luhnow their jobs, and Red Sox manager Alex Cora could be next.

Hinch and Luhnow were fired Monday after being suspended by Major League Baseball for the team’s illicit use of electronics to steal signs during the Astros’ run to the 2017 World Series title and again in the 2018 season.

In U.S. sports’ largest scandal since the Patriots’ “Spygate,” MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred announced the discipline and strongly hinted that Cora — the Astros bench coach in 2017 — will face equal or more severe punishment. Manfred said Cora developed the sign-stealing system used by the Astros. The Red Sox are under investigation for stealing signs in Cora’s first season as manager in 2018, when the Red Sox won the World Series.

The Astros were fined $5 million, the maximum allowed under the Major League Constitution, as punishment. The Astros will also forfeit their next two first- and second-round draft picks.

The investigation found that the Astros used the video feed from a center field camera to see and decode the opposing catcher’s signs. Players banged on a trash can to signal to batters what was coming, believing it would improve the batter’s odds of getting a hit.

Sign stealing is a legal and time-honored part of baseball as long as it is done with the naked eye — say, by a baserunner standing on second. Using technology is prohibited.

Astros players disputed whether knowing the pitches seconds in advance helped batters. The Astros had fewer wins at home than on the road, winning 94 home games and 110 on the road during the two seasons. There was no signstealing system on the road.

“While it is impossible to determine whether the conduct actually impacted the results on the field, the perception of some that it did causes significant harm to the game,” Manfred said.

Manfred, in his most significant action since becoming commissioner five years ago, said Hinch failed to stop the sign stealing and Luhnow was responsible for the players’ conduct even though he made the dubious claim he wasn’t aware. Manfred said owner Jim Crane wasn’t informed.

An hour after MLB announced its punishment, Crane opened a news conference by saying Hinch and Luhnow were fired.

“I have higher standards for the city and the franchise, and I’m going above and beyond MLB’s penalty,” he said. “We need to move forward with a clean slate.”

Crane, who said he learned of the discipline this weekend, was visibly upset during Monday’s news conference and insisted that the Astros’ championship, which culminated in a seven-game World Series over the Dodgers, wasn’t tainted.

“We want to be known as playing by the rules,” he said. “We broke the rules. We accept the punishment and we’re going to move forward ... if you read the report neither (Luhnow or Hinch) implemented this or pushed it through the system and (it) really came from the bottom up.”

Hinch’s penalty was among the longest for an MLB manager. The Dodgers’ Leo Durocher was suspended for one year by Commissioner Happy Chandler in April 1947 for the “accumulation of unpleasant incidents” detrimental to baseball, and the Reds’ Pete Rose was banned for life by Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti in August 1989 for betting on Reds games while managing.