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Baker also said that the Mariners had advance notice that the story was coming out. IIRC, he said they knew the rough outline of what was coming on the Monday before it came out. The story broke on Saturday evening. The Cano signing went down overnight Thursday night, again IIRC.
The point is, it raises the question, did the M's press on with signing Cano in spite of the story (i.e., had they made the decision prior to their knowledge of the story?), or because of it (i.e., had they made the decision after learning about the story, and was the Cano signing at least in part a reaction to it)?
There is, of course, a third possibility, that they made their decision after learning about the story, but the story did not have a major impact on their decision to sign Cano. The Mariners had made clear their intent to make a splash well before they knew about the story. But was the size of the splash they ended up making influenced by the need to overcome an even bigger hurdle than the one they faced before the story? And dare we even wonder if the timing of the deal (overnight Thursday night) was influenced by what they might have learned about the timing of the actual release of the story? Is it possible that instead of Baker supposedly trying to sabotage the M's best moment in forever, the M's hurried the conclusion of their attempts to sign Cano in order to get it completed before the story broke?
By the way, here is a link to an interview with Baker on 710 ESPN Radio Seattle:http://mynorthwest.com/?nid=577&a=9964939&p=38&n=