MLB Investigating Possible Collusion in Free Agency

Jeff Luhnow and AJ Hinch both suspended for a year, plus a $5M fine and loss of draft picks. But Houston gets to keep the World Series ring. Alex Cora is probably going to get at least a year too

It's a harsh penalty, but maybe not harsh enough to discourage other teams from doing it. We will see
 
Sig Hansen said:
Jeff Luhnow and AJ Hinch both suspended for a year, plus a $5M fine and loss of draft picks. But Houston gets to keep the World Series ring. Alex Cora is probably going to get at least a year too

It's a harsh penalty, but maybe not harsh enough to discourage other teams from doing it. We will see
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Not harsh enough?? Do you want the MLB to blindfold them and shoot them? It is certainly harsh enough and everyone will now either stop doing it, or be much more covert about it. Every manager and GM will be telling their players to not use the replay room for this.
 
wolves82 said:
LOL @ Red14. Massively oversimplified point of view, as usual. Of course MLB teams can manage their payrolls. They can choose to pay or not pay certain players certain amounts of money. They can talk with other teams about possible trades, what needs the other teams may have, etc.

What they cannot do, according to the CBA that everyone agreed to, is discuss their payroll intentions with other teams. More specifically, they cannot collude together to keep Free Agent salaries low. If Team A tells Team B "we won't pay more than $X for this player or that player", they are violating the spirit of free agency and the letter of the CBA law.

It will be hard to prove collusion. But it has happened twice before, and I believe the last time the MLB had to pay $280 Million to the players association for those collusion cases in the 1980's. Also, in this CBA, if the teams are found guilty of collusion, the players association can immediately opt to terminate the current CBA and open negotations for a new CBA.

Braves GM is an absolute dumb for saying what he said - it opens the door for the MLBPA to at least make life miserable for a while, and possibly extract some money from the teams to forgo a full-blown collusion case.

Sigh. Baseball does not need this right now. After historically low World Series TV ratings, having this as the primary off-season conversation is really not good.
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A hard salary cap will fix all of this, easily.
 
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