The Houston Astros technological cheating scandal continued to make Major League Baseball headlines again on Thursday. After A.J. Hinch was released from his duties as manager of the Astros and Alex Cora was fired by the Boston Red Sox, it was announced that the New York Mets were parting ways with manager Carlos Beltran of Manati, Puerto Rico.
Beltran leaves the Mets as their manager without even managing a Major League Baseball game. He was initially hired by New York on November 1 and had signed a three year contract.
What is different with Beltran however compared to Hinch and Cora is that he was a player for the Astros during the controversial 2017 Major League Baseball season when the Astros were first accused of using a centerfield camera to steal a catcher’s signs. Hinch was the Astros manager and Cora was the Astros bench coach.
It seems that Beltran played a role in the scandal according to Rob Manfred’s report. In the report, Beltran is accused of discussing ways to improve “decoding opposing teams’ signs and communicating the signs to the batter” according to Ray Sanchez of CNN.It should be also made clear that Beltran was the only player mentioned in the report.
The camera did not help Beltran too much. That season he only batted .231 with 14 home runs and 51 runs batted in. It will now be interesting to see if other players will be suspended, fined or released by Major League Baseball or the Astros due to this remarkable incident which started three years ago.
