I understand the union would have had a field day, but the players should have been punished somehow. You can't talk about the integrity of the game and then have a whole team complicit in cheating. You could argue that some didn't use the signs, fine, but they ALL knew about it, I don't think that's even up for dispute. So I don't get why they can't at least have some nominal punishment.
if the plan was devised from the top down by the coaches and managers then I don't think you can really punish the players. Granted, in this case I think the Astro players knew exactly what they were doing, but in general they can claim they were just following orders, and the PA would have probably hammered that home. "Player X went along out of fear that not doing so would have led to repercussions or ostracizing in the clubhouse..."