Why the Marlins and Major League Baseball are wrong to fine Boston

Spring Training is essentially a lot of nothing: players getting in shape by actually playing baseball against minor leaguers, prospects being highlighted as the potential future without much consequence, the usual golf, fishing, maybe some joking around.

However, no one apparently sent the memo to the Miami Marlins, who after a game against the Boston Red Sox, filed a grievance alleging that the Sox, a champion organization cheated both Miami and its fans by fielding a lineup of minor leaguers, save for Jackie Bradley. The Marlins had hoped for the actual championship team, and had thus inflated ticket prices.

The Red Sox responded with a personal tweet from owner John Henry which read as follows:

Major League Baseball responded by fining the Red Sox a small amount, but that small amount was way too much for an “offense” like not fielding a lineup of regulars during a spring training game. In fact, the logic behind the fine was that the Red Sox needed to put “at least four major leaguers, or players with a good shot at a major league roster spot” in the lineup.

This is stupidity to the nth degree; a team should have every right to field whomever they want in their lineup and shouldn’t have to acquiesce just because another team expects them to. In fact, what would have happened had the Red Sox done it, then gradually substituted the starters out? Would they have called the game?

A year ago, the San Antonio Spurs were fined for opting not to let their starters play in a game against the Miami Heat. Coahc Gregg Popovich defended the action as a means to let his star players, all except for one are above the age of 30, get a well deserved rest. Then-commissioner David Stern fined the team because according to him, the benching was not “In the best interests of basketball”.

Professional sports are a corporation by and large, but star players do deserve rest and should not be forced to play because of marketability. Granted, Popovich should have mentioned that he needed to rest his starters to avoid injury, but still, players are human beings as well.

The Marlins and Major League Baseball should be ashamed too. For one, Miami exploited fans by driving up prices for that one particular game. For another, Major League Baseball sided with the same team that has been viewed as having the worst management, is the prime example of a team entirely dependent on fire sales which gut the team of talent in return for players who may or may not pan out, who swindled the Miami taxpayers into building a stadium with public funds with the promise that a championship team would play there, only to sell off the championship pieces a year later, in short, it’s downright despicable and it shows the darker side of business in baseball.