I'm still betting it's the owners. My guess is that there are plenty of other organisations with skeletons they don't want uncovering, and taking drastic actions against the Astros might lead to the people being punished saying "freak you, if I'm going down I'm taking everyone else I can with me". Much better for them to sweep it all under the carpet and hope the fans move on.
I think if that were the case, teams would be telling players: "Look, what's done is done. We can't change it, so let's just answer with 'It sucks, but what can you do?' and let's move on."
The thing is, yes, every team has some skeletons, but this story was unbelievably bad--and getting worse. As bad as steroids were, I don't think that even compares to this. Being able to work out longer, recover faster, and even maybe gain some in-game skill enhancement is nothing compared to a professional hitter knowing exactly what pitch is coming.
Pros can hit a fastball. They can hit a curveball or a slider. But what makes it hard is that they don't which is coming. If you guess fastball, you swing before the ball gets there. If you guess curve, you swing when the ball's hitting the catcher's mitt. That's the only thing that makes a live game different from batting practice. CC Sabathia hit home runs in BP.
