Mom was right

After further review … As a kid, whenever I asked my mom if I could do something that bordered on out-ofthe-ordinary, or perhaps even illegal, and used the excuse “Well, Billy (our next-door neighbor) did it,” Mom would counter, “Well, if Billy jumped off his roof, would you?”

Her message, obviously was to get me to see the logic or illegality of my intention.

In today’s example, it was the illegality of the Houston Astros in the 2017 World Series, in which they used video cameras to capture the signs of their opponents that may have caused irrefutable damage to themselves and Major League Baseball.

Yes, the stealing of signs from Little League to the majors has always been an acceptable act in baseball. Actually, in most sports trying to see what your opponent is planning has been a way of attempting to get a jump on them.

“Thou shall not steal,” one of the Ten Commandments, is universally understood.

Of course, it does happen in other sports as it did to the New England Patriots in 2007. The era of technology seems to have caught up to sports franchises before they could right their ships. Certainly, some teams may have attempted it before, but were not caught.

Well, “Billy did it” doesn’t really cut it — never did. What happened to “just do the right thing,” which is what Houston Astros Owner Jim Crane did.

To recap, when Houston played in the 2017 World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Astros were found guilty of sign-stealing by using electronics. Astros employees in the team’s video replay room were decoding opponents’ signs from their center field cameras.

The Astros bench would call their video room, obtain the sign, then bang a bat on a trash can telling the batter — two bangs would be an off-speed pitch, curveball, slider, etc., and no bangs was a fastball.

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred’s investigation resulted in Astros manager A.J. Hinch and general manager

Jeff Luhnow being suspended from Major League Baseball for one year.

Manfred said while it’s impossible to determine if this misdeed actually impacted the results of that game, it did cause significant harm to the game.

Crane, who had hired both Hinch and Luhnow, fired them saying that while both may have not been directly involved, they knew what was happening and should have put a stop to it.

The Astros were fined $5 million and will forfeit their next two first and second-round amateur draft picks.

Will you put your integrity foremost when called upon to correct a misdeed?