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And that's ALL this is. What if it's a "Don't Mess With The Yankees" thing? The changeup at the last minute in the first Montero deal in 2011, going with Smoak from the Rangers instead. The Montero deal that was ultimately completed before the 2012 season, shortly after which Pineda was declared out for the season. Yankees brass decides not to get mad but get even? Throws it's influence around at the highest levels of MLB?
Of course it could just be no true conspiracy, just a complete disrespect of the organization.
But I didn't always feel as strongly about the M's and biased umpiring EXCEPT when it came to the Yankees. Any time the M's faced them you could see it plain as day. Now the last few years it seems to have become a consistent factor against most every team.
What I would like to see is a skilled analyst have access to the data and produce team-by-team and umpire-by-umpire. MLB would do everything they could to make this inaccessible, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see it. Is it just the M's? Is it all bottom-of-the-barrell franchises? Are there teams that get consistent "plus" treatment, and if so are there things they have in common that might indicate any factors that make this likely?