As Houston's scandal lingers, MLB may have shot itself in the foot over its investigation of Boston

Hooray! Spring training is here! How do I know this? By the blah-blah-blah. 

Deivi Garcia throws a bullpen session: "You can see why we're excited about him," gushes Aaron Boone. 

Gary Sanchez shows up: "We're excited about him working with all our new people," Boone says. 

Players piss in the showers: "It's exciting for me, watching these guys," Boone drivels. 

Somebody, shoot me. Boone could get excited about a bar of soap. In the future, when we start ragging on the Gammonites - (who are enormously endangered, by the way) - let's remember this day and cut them a bit of slack. They annually must devour, digest and excrete the official Yankee propaganda of February, some of the most fetid, mind-numbing crapola spoken outside of North Korea. 

Every February, I get an urge to re-read the Yankee quotes from the previous year. My fave is the annual Yankee who has "redefined himself," arriving in "the greatest shape of his career," whose newly carved, rock-ribbed, Brad Pitt-in-Troy body has onlookers going knock-kneed in anticipation of the coming season. And by June 1, the guy is hitting .183. But, wowie-kazowie!, on that first day of camp, he sure oogled the Tampa red carpet. 

Like most citizens of the Yankiverse, today, I am still in no mood for write-ups about prospects, or the battle for the fifth rotation slot. A month from now, we can marvel about or debate such matters. Right now, I'm still angry about the cheating scandal, and I'm wondering why the Putin of baseball, Commissioner Rob Manfred, keeps rolling back the timeline on his "investigation" into the Boston Redsocks' championship 2018 season.

It was supposed to come out by Feb. 1. Then, it was supposed to come out by the opening day of camp. Now, it's supposed to come out by March 1. Something is screwy, and my guess is that the obvious has come to pass: 

As they've watched Houston players be publicly ridiculed - (while escaping actual punishment) - the Redsocks have closed ranks and built a big Green Monster Wall of Silence when talking to investigators.

Yep, MLB has completely fumbled the case.

Listen: The news last week in America is that witness tampering is now "in." (See PEOPLE V. ROGER STONE.) It's now okay to tell a potential whistle-blower that he should fear getting shot, or losing his dog, because - haha! - boys will be boys, and goofy disembowelment threats are one of the joys of locker room talk. 

On that note, imagine the recent conversations between Redsock players, as they watch Jose Altuve being grilled on why he didn't want to be seen shirtless.  

Obviously, I have no inside track on whether the Redsocks are guilty or innocent. But this I do know: Cheaters lie. Especially the good ones. That's why they're cheaters. And if they successfully cheat, odds are that they will later claim they didn't. It's their shtick. It's their routine. So, yesterday, Andrew Benintendi - who I'm sure is a truth-teller, probably in the greatest shape of his life, etc., - crossed his heart and told reporters, "I just think we know what's going on, and we know we didn't do anything." 

Okay, maybe they did, maybe they didn't. I dunno. But good luck to that poor MLB investigator who is still trying to untangle the Houston scandal from what happened in Boston. Because Manfred shot that poor slob in the butt, when he announced the sanctions against Houston, leaving the Redsocks on the back-burner. What a gift to Boston, whose owner responded by trading its greatest star, thus holding the line on MLB salaries. Quid pro quo? Who knows? But the longer this case drags on, the more that Redsock players and personnel will close ranks. And the more likely Boston will wriggle off the hook. But, hey, how about that Deivi Garcia! I hear Boone is excited.