Column: Astros get the punishment, Dodgers pay the price

AJ Hinch won’t be managing in the big leagues any time soon, if at all. Alex Cora will soon join him in the unemployment line, and it’s hard to believe anyone will ever give him another job that involves being a leader of men.

The punishments — technically Cora’s is still to come — fit the crime, and for that baseball commissioner Rob Manfred deserves a pat on the back. Give another one to Astros owner Jim Crane, who did his part to clean up an increasingly smelly mess in Houston by immediately firing both his manager and general manager.

But that doesn’t bring real justice. It can’t.

Not to the Los Angeles Dodgers, who are now at 32 years and counting without a World Series title

Not to Clayton Kershaw, whose postseason failings were magnified in game 5 at Minute Maid Park when the Dodgers ace was raked for six runs and didn’t make it out of the fifth inning.

And certainly not to Yu Darvish, whose reputation — and nearly his career — got trashed when he was routed by the Astros in two games of the 2017 World Series.

Yes, the official record shows the Houston Astros are still your 2017 World Series champions and that's not going to change regardless of the outcry from Southern California.

But does anyone really believe it?

Watch the second inning of Game 3 once again and then decide. That’s when Darvish was touched up for four runs and the Astros took a 2-1 lead in the series.

It was almost as if the hitters knew what was coming — which, of course, they did.

If you’re still not convinced, Game 5 should be evidence enough. Like Game 3 it took place at Minute Maid Park, where the cameras were rolling, the dugout trash can was booming and the Astros bats were blazing.

All with arguably the best pitcher in baseball since the turn of the century...

source https://www.chron.com/sports/article/Column-Astros-get-the-punishment-Dodgers-pay-14973022.php