New York Yankees fans, you’re going to want to sit down for this one. And then you’re going to want to immediately log onto Twitter, find all the Astros fans you can, copy-and-paste the same insult hundreds of times, then never speak of this again.
Because … the moment they’ve been waiting for is here. The infamous ‘Yankee Letter’ has been unsealed and leaked to SNY’s Andy Martino, author of Cheated, the definitive guide to the electronic sign-stealing scandals of the modern era.
And the letter … contains … next to nothing, as Martino assured us it would long ago.
In short, it’s an admonition of the Yankees’ behavior in 2015 and 2016, when they used the replay review room to decode signs and have runners on second relay them to the batter. Occasionally, they also used the dugout phone. The letter also makes it clear the Yankees did not defy any rules in place, and stopped long before MLB issued an edict to cease all similar actions on Sept. 15, 2017.
The Boston Red Sox and Houston Astros both continued their schemes past this date, and were punished for doing so. The Yankees, meanwhile, were fined $100,000 for their 2015-16 actions, which resulted in zero playoff wins and a trade deadline sell-off.
Hope that helps.
Details of the 2017 ‘Yankees Letter’ on sign-stealing revealed
This will only cause ‘reputational harm’ to the Yankees among America’s dumbest, and that’s … just fine.
Again, the Cliff Notes version:
- The Yankees tattled on the Red Sox for what they suspected was illicit use of the replay room.
- When MLB looked into that complaint, they deemed the Yankees were also doing the same thing they tattled on the Sox for doing — namely, using runners on second to communicate signs they swiped from newly-installed video access.
- The Yankees stopped well prior to Sept. 2017, reportedly not even using the system during their resurgent 2017 season.
- The Red Sox … didn’t listen to MLB’s memo, continuing to use the exact same system through their 2018 World Series-winning season. They were punished appropriately, but reportedly never communicated stolen signs without a runner on second. B- cheating, at best.
- The Astros? Whew boy, they are STILL the worst. They’re the only team determined to have spread stolen signs without a runner on second base. Real time, baby. Real time.
In conclusion: Yankees meh (and never used YES Network cameras, according to MLB’s letter), Red Sox were disobedient little stinkers, Astros remain the cream of the cheating crop.
As we were told time and again, Tuesday’s letter reveal was a nothingburger for the Bombers, whose reputation has only been impacted by being singled out in this process, as well as five-years-too-late mentions of their 2015 and ’16 missteps.
Rest in peace to Michael Schwab, who’s still rewinding and pausing a blurry video of some intern videotaping Didi Gregorius at the plate during the 2018 Wild Card Game, printing out still images of the footage and taping it to a corkboard like Carrie from “Homeland,” mid-breakdown (and not the Jomboy kind). This is also terrible news for every Houstonian confident Carlos Beltran invented sign-stealing in the Bronx, stole the plans, and shipped them to Texas in the dead of night.
The Yankees didn’t do much. The Astros did MUCH. That settles it.
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