The burning (Mike) Fiers left his mark as the Astros learned their fate today. But this penalty didn’t approach the crime, and that should leave the Atlanta Braves wondering about MLB justice.
Apparently, the penalties imposed on the Atlanta Braves in 2017 are now ‘old news’.
That’s my conclusion as SiriusXM MLB Network Radio host Casey Stern opened his afternoon show on Monday with the declaration that the Astros had just been hit with the stiffest penalty to any team in the history of sports (no link available).
Uh… no. Not so fast… and in fact, this was a penalty that did not approach the crime. We’ll get to that in detail.
First, though, let’s compare the behavior and the results – even as we’re fully aware that more penalties are still to come.
The Coppy Machine
In November 2017, MLB ruled that the Atlanta Braves ‘circumvented international signing rules’ during the period of 2015 through 2017. Here’s the gist of those violations:
- In that 2015-16 signing period, Atlanta cooked the books in reallocating funds among multiple players to make it look like the rules were being followed… this to keep them from incurring a by-the-rules penalty preventing high-dollar signings for the next 2 seasons.
- In doing so, 9 players were signed in 2016-17 that should have been unavailable, including the (then) highly-prized Kevin Maitan and Abrahan Gutierrez. 3 others were likewise ‘packaged’ in a scheme similar to the one executed the year earlier.
- There were other future agreements made for players coming along in the future: Korea’s Ji-Hwan Bae, who was offered under-the-table money; and Robert Puason, who signed this year with Oakland (another ‘packaging’ arrangement was involved for the then 14-year-old).
- It was also determined that OF Drew Waters was offered ‘side compensation’ to make up for accepting a lower bonus when drafted.
Here were the penalties handed down:
- Loss of the 3rd round draft pick in 2018
- Existing rules involving penalties for exceeding spending caps Internationally for 2018 were maintained.
- 2019-20 International signing period: no player signed for anything above a $10,000 bonus.
- 2020-21 International signing period: 50% reduction in bonus money level
- All 12 players signed in that 2016-17 period were released from the Braves.
- Bae’s contract was disallowed.
- Robert Puason’s agreement was voided and the Braves prohibited from signing him specifically.
- International Special Assistant Gordon Blakeley was suspended for 1 year.
- Other Braves’ International operations employees were ‘disciplined’ separately.
- John Coppolella was placed on the permanently ineligible list.
- The Atlanta Braves lost the $40+ million spent on those 12 players taken from them (between bonuses paid and taxes on the spending overages).
Mind you – this is harsh, but (with multiple years of hindsight) feels more like a fit to the crime, though the extended years of lost presence in the International market is the most punitive.
Other than the loss of the $40 million, the biggest impact penalty was clearly the damage to the International pipeline of talent – both in the form of the players taken away and in unknown future players that could have been developed by the organization.
After all, the 2018-2020 major league club has been looking to some home-grown International talents like Ozzie Albies, Johan Camargo, and Ronald Acuña Jr to lead their current push.
You can look back at the group stripped away from Atlanta and note that in almost every case, the hype was overblown – particularly about Maitan, who is struggling in A-ball in the Angels’ system.
That’s not so much the point here: it was about the penalties and loss of a stream of talent. In fact, the best player noted in that MLB finding may have been Puason… who the Braves had on the hook but never had in hand.
But the scheme executed by Blakeley and Coppolella all involved potential talent… the chance to develop players with expectations of future greatness. Given the results thus far, you could certainly argue that this illustrates why prospects are still unknown until they can actually produce at the major league level.
Certainly though: none of this has had any impact on a single major league baseball game. At best, the Braves might still be a couple of years away from using any of these removed players, had they developed quickly.
That leads us directly to the news of this week.