Houston Astros, We Have a Problem…

PD Shaw says:

While I don’t like Luhnow and am not entirely certain that he should have been suspended since MLB found “no evidence to suggest that Luhnow was aware of the banging scheme,” no doub the scope of the problem mattered in terms of the difficulty in punishing players involved, playing on other teams and protected by union process, and the uncertainty embedded in the world series games.

But this part of the report certainly meant that the Astros had to fire him:

“But while no one can dispute that Luhnow’s baseball operations department is an industry leader in its analytics, it is very clear to me that the culture of the baseball operations department, manifesting itself in the way its employees are treated, its relations with other Clubs, and its relations with the media and external stakeholders, has been very problematic. At least in my view, the baseball operations department’s insular culture – one that valued and rewarded results over other considerations, combined with a staff of individuals who often lacked direction or sufficient oversight, led, at least in part, to the Brandon Taubman incident, the Club’s admittedly inappropriate and inaccurate response to that incident, and finally, to an environment that allowed the conduct described in this report to have occurred.”Report