Is the time right now for the Phillies to bribe Scott Boras?

A lot of holes on the Philadelphia Phillies roster could be filled with a single phone call.

Veteran Philadelphia Phillies watcher Bob Brookover put the matter under discussion here into focus Dec. 1 toward the end of his column that showed up on my front porch. Brookover’s interests in his piece were the Braves and Nationals, but along the way he noted that agent Scott Boras represents Stephen Strasburg, Anthony Rendon, Gerrit Cole, Dallas Keuchel, Hyun-Jin Ryu, and Mike Moustakas.

Well, is that all? Every single player here would be a useful plug for a gaping hole in the Phillies starting lineup or rotation.

In other words, and of course, I want to be careful here because I don’t want to pay for a lawyer…

Oh, the hell with it: This is the year to pay off Scott Boras.

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But, you say, wouldn’t this be, as the phrase usually goes, “commercial bribery and theft”? Under Pennsylvania law bribing a player to affect an athletic contest negatively has been illegal since 1921, but part of that law also reads, “It is unlawful for any person to in any manner influence, or attempt to influence, any person participating in any athletic contest to so conduct himself” in that contest, “as to bring about, or tend to bring about” defeat.

Now, I’m not a lawyer nor do I play one on TV, but it seems this could be applied to any agent accepting a bribe to steer players towards one team, but not another team one of his other athletes plays for.

See, that would be influencing “in any manner” that other player because he’d have to play on a weaker team that might have benefited from the players they didn’t get. Playing on a weaker team “tend[s] to bring about” defeat.

But what if all the Boras athletes were aware – all of his clients? What if Scottie said to all of them, very confidentially, “Hey, I’m going to steer three of our guys to the Phillies”? Maybe he’d add, “We’ll work up similar deals for all of you – we’ll build winning teams. And there will be a nice bonus this holiday season.”

Are you entirely sure that’s illegal? Be careful here.

Hmm. Is anything in the law entirely sure? Especially in 2019? When you have a Philadelphia lawyer?

Would this be an antitrust violation? As Stephen F. Ross, a Penn State law professor, explains, professional baseball is “shielded” from the laws that require others to “compete in an open and free marketplace to supply consumers with the best possible product at the lowest possible price and to allocate society’s resources efficiently.”

Still, most people would see this, whatever the exemption, as cheating.

Well, as any good Philadelphia lawyer would say, you can see how sticky this all could be.

All of which seriously suggests the Phillies will have to be extra sneaky about this bribe. In order to secure Cole, Ryu, and Rendon, the Phillies should physically send a representative to the Cayman Islands to personally place a document in a safe deposit box indicating Boras owns 3% of the Phillies, but that may be only revealed after Boras announces retirement, and he may not disclose this fact until 2040 – or after his death, whichever comes first. (Boras’ assistant may go along on this trip to verify matters, if he or she is a closed-mouth type, or is effectively threatened.)

I can give you a couple more ideas on this sort of bribe actually.

In all seriousness, though, it is entirely clear that the Philadelphia Phillies’ road to success in 2020 runs straight through Scott Boras.