Members of the St. Louis Cardinals have been accused into hacking into the database of rivals Houston Astros.

The FBI are leaving the investigation, which is believed to be the first instance of sporting espionage in which one team has hacked into the database of another.

The alleged hacking centres Jeff Luhnow's move from St. Louis to Houston. Luhnow was a scout at the Cardinals before moving to the Astros in 2011 to become General Manager.

Luhow brought many of his colleagues to Houston with him. While at the Cardinals the team used a general team database with statistics and methods that the side claimed Luhnow may have used at his new team.

It is alleged that Luhnow and his team used the same passwords on a similar database, used in Houston, which helped Cardinals staff gain access.

The St. Louis Cardinals are one of the most successful teams in recent memory of professional baseball. They last won the World Series in 2011. Their 11 titles ranks them in second place on the all time list, behind the New York Yankees.

Off the Ball's Donny Mahoney spoke about the incident on last nights show.