Yankees were fined $100,000 for improper use of dugout phone

NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Yankees were fined $100,000 by baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred for using their dugout phone to relay information about opposing teams’ signs during the 2015 season and part of 2016.

The fine was disclosed in a Sept. 14, 2017, letter from Manfred to Yankees general manager Brian Cashman that is set to be unsealed in U.S. District Court in New York this week as part of a dismissed lawsuit by a fan. The letter's contents were first reported Tuesday by SNY and the letter was obtained by The Associated Press.

MLB has said the fine was for violating rules on the use of the dugout phone but made the distinction that the Yankees did not use electronics to steal signs, a greater violation that led in January 2020 to the Houston Astros getting fined $5 million and resulted in one-year suspensions for Astros manager AJ Hinch and general manager Jeff Luhnow, who were both fired for the team's conduct during the 2017 season.

Manfred announced on Sept. 15, 2017, that he had fined the Yankees for violating a rule about the use of a dugout phone but did not publicly detail the violation and did not announce the fine amount. He announced the penalty at the same time he fined the Boston Red Sox for sending electronic communications from their video replay room to an athletic trainer in the dugout.

In the letter, Manfred said the Yankees filed a formal complaint with baseball’s department of investigations on Aug. 23, 2017, about the Red Sox using a smart watch to relay information to players.

During the probe, an individual — the name was redacted in the copy of the letter set to be unsealed — said, “the Yankees used a similar scheme to that of the Red Sox to decode opposing clubs’ signs and relay them to the batter when a runner was on second base,”...

source https://www.chron.com/sports/article/Yankees-were-fined-100-000-for-improper-use-of-17128745.php