A creative way to solve baseball's unprecedented cheating scandal

The Houston Astros cheating scandal in baseball is unprecedented – and calls for unprecedented punishment.

If you don't know about the scandal, it's a doozy: Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred early this winter confirmed long-held suspicions that the Astros used technology to steal signs from opposing catchers to pitchers in order to give their hitters an advantage during the 2017 and 2018 seasons. The technology was reasonably high-tech (hidden cameras, spreadsheets), the communication was primitive (banging on garbage cans with a bat to signal that an off-speed pitch was coming). The big problem? The Astros won the World Series in 2017, one of the years baseball says they cheated.

The Astros cheated and won the World Series. Who do they think they are, Lance Armstrong?

The 2017 cheating-championship combination brought a torrent of criticism and worse, including opposing pitchers threatening to throw at Houston hitters this year.

Manfred suspended the team's manager and general manager, who were both subsequently fired. Two other managers affiliated with the scandal also lost their jobs. But that was it.

No players were punished, the World Series trophy stayed in Houston and anger against the Astros multiplied after the team owner and players downplayed the impact of their duplicity.

There is more anger toward the Astros than against any team in any sport during my lifetime – and the Astros players largely escaped punishment, although their championship is tainted and the players now have this as part of their legacy.

Despite inaction, this is the time to institute specific punishment. Manfred figures he can't take away the World Series title (although he could–just declare it vacant for 2017. However, there's no way he can award the title to the team the Astros beat, because that's the Dodgers), but he can do something.

The best way to punish the Astros? Do to them what they did to the rest of baseball in 2017 (and maybe 2018 and maybe 2019 and maybe 2020): Put them at a disadvantage. And embarrass them.

Here's how to punish the Astros and make the 2020 baseball season more fun:

• Require the Astros to put quotation marks around any words that refer to excellence in their 2017 season. (Such as: When the Astros "won" the 2017 World Series "title," it was the first "championship" in franchise history.)
• Make the Astros choose between giving their opponents and extra out each inning or losing an offensive out each inning. It's their choice: Nine innings of batting with only two outs per inning or nine innings of pitching to a team that gets four outs per inning.
• Allow the opponents to pick out five bats for each game that the Astros must use. Maybe a kids' bat. Maybe a fungo bat, used to hit fly balls. Maybe a wiffle-ball bat. Maybe a broomstick. The game is regular, just a slight adjustment in their odds to win. Like in 2017.
• Force Astros pitchers to declare what pitch they will throw ahead of time. Let those pitchers determine whether it is a distinct advantage for the hitter to know what's coming.
• Force the players to live in Houston for nine months per year. No, wait. They already do.

Baseball has a terrible scandal. The best way to get past it is for a public punishment that gives the Astros a chance to win, but dramatically swings the odds.

You know, like the Astros did in 2017 and 2018.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@hotmail.com.