The Boston Red Sox and International Free Agent Exploits

So the Red Sox may have exploited (AKA cheated) the International Free Agent system this year? Wonder if ESPN even covers it....

— Greedy Pinstripes (@GreedyStripes) May 11, 2016

The internet is a gift and a curse much like most everything on a long enough time line. You can easily sit down and write our 100 pros and 100’s cons for most anything on the internet. WebMD is great because it can save you hundreds of dollars in doctor bills only to find out the Mexican you ate for lunch gave you heartburn but at the same time it seems obligatory to put “cancer” down as a possible cause for each and every symptom on the site. This can be said about Twitter as well which I absolutely adore. I love the fact that you can talk to people around the world at any given time but at the same time, especially if you run a blog, you have lots of opinions and lots of differing opinions that you may not necessarily agree with. How you handle those opinions either makes you a nice guy, a troll or a jerk and there is usually no in between. I will reserve judgement on which one of these three I received this week when I discussed the MLB Trade Rumors article showcasing the fact that the league is now investigating the Boston Red Sox for possibly exploiting and cheating the international free agents market but it sure was a doozy.

If you missed what happened here is the Reader’s Digest version of it. The Red Sox signed a boat load of IFA’s including Yoan Moncada a year back and now face the same penalties as the Yankees do in the international market. Neither team can sign an IFA for more than $300K and while that has slowed down the Yankees pursuits of the top tiered talent in the league that has not stopped the Red Sox whatsoever. The league is investigating the Red Sox after the team signed a group of IFA’s that all share the same trainers for exactly $300K despite the fact that these men were expected to sign for much more this summer. The league thinks the Red Sox signed them all as a package deal which not officially breaking any written rule it is still an exploit.

Now me being me, a Yankees fan with a Yankees blog and a Yankees-centric passionate following, I posted something on twitter along the lines of “The Boston Red Sox are exploiting (AKA cheating) the IFA system and I wonder if ESPN will even cover it” and apparently some of my Red Sox readers took offense to that. This one follower in specific asked me things such as “did you read the details of what is being investigated? It’s laughable and not “cheating.” When I pushed back that MLB Trade Rumors ran the article, a credible news source, and that yes I was pretty well versed in what had been released to the public I got what I consider to be an immature “back against the wall” comment. The comment, word for word, was “show me the rule that is being broken. If you think that the IFA system is without its flaws you are mistaken.”

Now. I don’t remember saying the IFA system was perfect or that anything in this world other than my wife and children were without its flaws. All my work is very well documented either on Twitter or on my blog and I challenge anyone to show me where I said it was perfect or without flaws. Secondly we can argue semantics all day but those same semantics have to go both ways. Boston Red Sox fans, for the most part because you cannot lump them all together obviously, were up in arms when Alex Rodriguez took steroids and thought he should be suspended for it. If I threw out a hypothetical response along the lines of “show me a failed test” most Red Sox fans wouldn’t want to hear that. They would argue masking agents and all that hoopla. So no, there isn’t a specific rule written that says you can sign a small village to $300K deals each but when you get your money you have to give $200K of yours to this guy and you have to give $150K of yours to that guy but that doesn’t make it any less of an exploit. Exploits, semantics or not or no matter how you want to spin it, is cheating. If you disagree I respect that but I believe you’re wrong. That’s my opinion and you should respect that.

Look, I get it. You’re a homer. I understand because I’m a homer too. Maybe we can be friends, we have plenty of non-Yankees fans friends on our blog including some Red Sox fans. We’re respectful to those who are respectful to us despite their allegiances but when you come at us like this that changes this into a whole new ball game. And no, I won’t put their Twitter handle on this post or link to their site, who did it is not important. It’s the message. It’s the need for respect. We’re all fans here and if you’re just happy your team is doing whatever they need to do to win then just say it. I’ll respect you a whole lot more for it.

Be good everyone and Happy Friday!