The Houston Astros have been the focal point of baseball for much of the offseason as their sign-stealing scandal has captured headlines since its revelation. In the aftermath of Major League Baseball handing down its punishment, Astros manager AJ Hinch was fired along with GM Jeff Luhnow. The club has been scrutinized endlessly, and seemingly every at-bat over the course of the past three seasons has become a source of amusement for those searching for continued transgression.
Hinch sat down with Tom Verducci to discuss his former club, addressing the public for the first time since his termination. MLB Network will air the full interview on Friday at 6 p.m. Clips from the interview were made available on Thursday and included soundbites from Hinch:
“We’re going to have to live and move forward and be better in this sport, but unfortunately no one can really answer that question. I can’t really pinpoint what advantages or what happened or what exactly would have happened otherwise, but we did it to ourselves.”
These comments hardly signal contrition from Hinch despite the widespread disdain for Houston, given how significant an impact their scandal had on the careers of others in the past three seasons. The extent to which the Astros benefited from cheating will never be known, but being talented is not an excuse for cheating the game. If the Astros were capable of winning the World Series without the added benefit of prior knowledge of each pitch, they should have done so. As it stands, they will go down in history alongside the “Black Sox” as embarrassments to the sanctity of baseball.
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