Concentric corruption

Wider and wider now it spreads outward, like ripples radiating from the splash of a stone in a quiet pond. A.J. Hinch and Jeff Luhnow begat Alex Cora begat Carlos Beltran, who got the gate as Mets manager yesterday without ever managing a game.

This is the way scandals work, pulling in more and more of those involved in concentric circles, implicating more and more of the bad actors who gave the scandal life. And raising more and more questions as it does.

The latest: Did or did not Houston Astros' stars Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman wear electronic devices under the right shoulder of their uniforms that buzzed when a certain pitch was coming?

Major League Baseball says there's no evidence of that, but all that means is they didn't find any. It won't stop the rumor mill now grinding away in one clubhouse after another that Altuve and Bregman did, in fact, wear such devices, using as fuel the fact that Altuve is heard on audio pointedly telling his teammates not to tear off his jersey after he hit the walkoff home run that knocked out the Yankees in the ALCS in 2019.

So, there's that. Or not.

In any case, as the scandal expands concentrically, the question becomes whether or  not MLB's punishment for it will expand accordingly. Even discounting the Altuve/Bregman rumors, after all, it's incontrovertibly true that it was players who were banging on that trash can to tell their teammate at the plate what pitch was coming.

One of those players, in 2017, was Beltran. If he loses his job because he might have been involved in the sign-stealing scheme, shouldn't other involved players be disciplined for it as well?

To be sure, that may yet be coming. Anyone who, at this point, thinks those ripples aren't going to continue to expand isn't paying attention. And if they do, it makes little sense for Rob Manfred to swing his hammer as forcefully as he did and then just stop at the Astros' manager and GM.

If you're going to suspend those two for a full season, what about the players who actually carried out the scheme? How do you not start handing out suspensions for them, too?

In other words: Stay tuned. Those ripples are still spreading.