Get beyond the morality policing and crime and punishment aspect of the Red Sox breaking MLB rules against using electronics to steal signs against the Yankees.

Let’s just concentrate on the technology because that is the larger issue here. Teams have been trying to steal signs since the advent of, well, teams. What MLB and its clubs must decide is how to police technological advancements that are moving quicker than ever.

Because I ran this statement by three executives Wednesday whose intelligence I value, and they all agreed with it: “The game is smarter than ever and too often worse for it.”

Think of all the pitching changes as an example of this: The data show limiting the times a starter is exposed to a lineup and making hitters deal with fresh relievers consistently will subdue run scoring. But it also makes the games drag, never more so than in September with expanded rosters/bullpens.

We see this in other sports, too. In the NBA, for example, smart people figured out that taking 3-pointers and layups was the most efficient offense. The mid-range game disappeared. Is the game better for this when whole areas of the court go mostly unused for shooting?

Now, move to what the Red Sox did by putting a modern twist on the age-old attempt to decipher catcher signs and relay them to the hitter to clue him into what kind of pitch is coming and/or where it is coming. Some of the explosive nature of this was because it was Red Sox-Yankees. There have been a lot of sign-stealing accusations through the years that come and go with far less uproar and sustainability of outrage.

What makes this different is the technology and how it continues to embed into the game. One NL executive said of that invasion: “Now, I have a three-step log-in process because of the Cardinals.” The official was making reference to the hacking into the Astros player-personnel database that led to a four-year prison sentence for former St. Louis scouting director Chris Correa and penalties leveled against the Cardinals.

“I do think the, ‘If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying,’ is a sad reality,” said another NL executive.

The tentative sale of the downtrodden Marlins for more than $1.2 billion recently reiterated just how big these businesses are, and like every big business, the attempt to gain an edge is prevalent. One of the executives said, “You are not doing your job if you are not pushing the envelope and finding loopholes.”

The problem comes when pushing rules becomes breaking them. What the Red Sox did was ignore a written rule about using electronics in the dugout to steal signs. All three executives spoken to were from NL teams, picked so that they did not have a direct stake in Yankees-Red Sox, and all said Boston went across an acceptable line and should receive a stiff penalty. None thought the Red Sox would get much more than a symbolic slap on the wrist, however.

“They would probably pay more to buy one win over the Yankees than they will get fined,” one of the executives said.

Whatever penalty commissioner Rob Manfred levies this time, he must make a public statement that the next offender will face more significant suspensions, loss of draft picks and fines to construct a greater deterrent roadblock. Because neither the smart people nor the technology is going away, nor is the pressure to succeed (think fame/finances) that push people toward skirting rules.

Think, for example, of all the jobs that exist in the game that did not even a decade ago, from data analyst to mental-skills coaches to sports-science specialists, as teams try to find even a 1 percent edge. What would stop a team from hiring a former member of the intelligence community who excels at code breaking, sitting him next to its video replay guy and having him decipher catcher signals and coaches’ signs? Are we OK with that? Are we sure no team is doing that already?

A question we will have to ask a lot now as an industry and fans is at what point have we gone too far in empowering the off-field strategists and their technology, to the detriment of the on-field product. Because you can’t legislate against hiring smart people or the evolution of technology.

One of the answers, I believe, will be using the technology to provide a better game. For example, the idea of putting fingers down by a catcher feels so 1800s now. There has to be a communication system either with headsets or by the pitcher or catcher tapping a wired piece of equipment that will keep the choice of a pitch/location less obvious. That secrecy will stop so many of the endless, paranoia-infused catcher visits to the mound to change signs.

“The sign stealing is a big problem with time of game,” one of the executives said. “Who wants to watch a catcher go to mound twice, the pitcher shake off, go through signs again, have the catcher set up late, it all takes times and all takes the air out of the building.”

In this case, there may be a solution at hand to do something about high-tech theft and pace of play. That should be a priority for MLB and a positive result out of this latest Red Sox-Yankees hostility.