More criticism
Angels’ Trout calls sanctions too light.
TEMPE, Ariz. — Mike Trout thinks the Astros should pay more dearly for their cheating ways.
The Los Angeles Angels’ threetime AL MVP ripped the Astros and questioned the discipline handed out by Major League Baseball on Monday after he reported to spring training. Trout joined the chorus of prominent big leaguers angry about Houston’s rampant sign stealing on its way to the 2017 World Series title and beyond.
“It’s sad for baseball,” he said. “It’s tough. They cheated. I don’t agree with the punishments, the players not getting anything. It was a player-driven thing. It sucks, too, because guys’ careers have been affected. A lot of people lost jobs. It was tough.
“Me going up to the plate knowing what was coming? It would be fun up there. A lot of guys lost respect for some of the guys.”
Trout said a few members of the Astros reached out to him during the offseason to explain their side, but Trout didn’t sound impressed.
“You don’t know what helped them or what not,” he said. “But if you know what’s coming, it’s going to definitely help them. I don’t know if you take the trophy away or take the rings away, but they should definitely do something.”
Trout didn’t make a suggestion for what the Astros players’ punishment should have been, but the scandal obviously touched a nerve in the Halos’ brilliant center fielder, who has spent his entire career trying to outhit the Astros.
“Obviously the GM got fired, and Hinch got fired,” Trout said of penalties for Jeff Luhnow and manager A.J. Hinch. “But the players getting nothing, that’s definitely not right, for sure.”
Manfred’s ‘piece of metal’ quip criticized
Players who have won a World Series — and those who have come up short — seethed Monday at commissioner Rob Manfred’s reference to the sport’s championship trophy as merely a “piece of metal,” saying that comment reflected a disconnect between baseball’s boss and those who produce the product on the field.
“It bothered me, man. I hated it. It made him sound really out of touch,” said reliever Sean Doolittle, a member of the 2019 title-winning Nationals. “That’s the holy grail of our sport. That’s what we show up for in the beginning of February, thinking about and working towards.”
As with so many things being talked about around the majors as spring training gets started, this all stems from the Astros’ sign-stealing scam in 2017 and 2018.
Some think the Astros should be stripped of their 2017 championship, but Manfred said this on Sunday in an interview with ESPN: “The idea of an asterisk or asking for a piece of metal back seems like a futile act.”
That phrasing did not sit well. Doolittle and other players noted that the official name of the hardware itself is The Commissioner’s Trophy.
“For him to devalue it the way he did yesterday just tells me how out of touch he is with the players in this game. At this point, the only thing devaluing that trophy is that it says ‘commissioner’ on it,” said Justin Turner, whose Dodgers lost to the Astros in the 2017 Series.
Odds and ends
Braves manager Brian Snitker and his coaching staff were given one-year contract extensions through the 2021 season. General manager Alex Anthopoulos was extended for three years through the 2024 season and given the additional title of president of baseball operations. … The Angels agreed to a minor league deal with reliever Ryan Buchter.