At the Athletic, behind the pay wall, Evan Drellich makes the case that MLB could not have punished players for the cheating scandal.

Despite widespread calls for league action, the commissioner cannot wake up one day and decide which behavior to punish and how. Not without a major fight that he would likely lose anyway. The players’ union guards against such action.

Any potential punishments to Astros players would have prompted grievances and wound up before an arbitrator. And in the words of an official with knowledge of these matters, MLB would have been “smoked.” Another person experienced in this area said that MLB’s case would have been “brutal” and the league would “look a fool.”

The reason? In labor relations, the concept of giving notice is hugely important. Management must clearly lay out how the workplace is to be run. That means providing both notice of the rules and notice of what type of punishment will follow if those rules are broken.

TheAthletic.com

This is why I find the players complaining about the commissioner a bit disingenuous. I also am more convinced than ever that Manfred is playing three dimensional chess here. The focus of the next CBA negotiation should be lowering the barriers to free agency; fewer years to free agency, no compensation, no service time manipulation. Instead, Manfred will point out to the union that their members are demanding that the commissioner punish cheaters, so the negotiation moves to that issue instead of the more important economic issues.

The players need to take that off the table. They need to discipline those members through the MLBPA. Then the union can concentrate on what their members really need.