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Major League Baseball will investigate Scott Boras' claims that anonymous comments in a recent ESPN article "damaged" the market for his clients, Kendrys Morales and Stephen Drew, reports Jon Heyman of CBS Sports.
The quotes in the story negatively affected Morales and Drew, according to Boras, which would be a violation of the portion of the collective bargaining agreement that prohibits executives from making public statements that could injure a player's market.
The players union is backing Boras in his efforts to have the comments investigated, even going as far as asking the league to use its subpoena powers to uncover the identities of the executives who spoke with ESPN.
In the article, specific figures were speculated on, which could set the market for Drew and Morales at numbers much lower than they were originally seeking.
The league does not appear to be likely to side with Boras. MLB Chief Operations Officer Rob Manfred made the league's position on the matter rather apparent.
"It is ludicrous, absurd, that one [Internet] report somehow alters the market for players who have been out there for months ... Over the years, I have learned that it is a waste of time to pay attention to anonymous quotes which may or may not be genuine. Given that the regular season is well under way, it is hard to imagine that anonymous comments would have any effect whatsoever on the market for any individual player. There are many other factors that better explain the current situation faced by a very small number of free agents."
The hesitation to sign Drew and/or Morales is partially because of the draft pick compensation attached to them after they declined qualifying offers from their 2013 teams in November.
However, the fact that two players as talented as Drew and Morales can't get onto MLB rosters is a legitimate problem. Boras might not be able to force owners to pay his clients because of this incident, but it could be a sign that the parameters of contract negotiations are likely to change soon.