Yankees can only watch sit back and watch the Mets thrive
NEW YORK — With one bold and spectacular trade, Steve Cohen and the Mets have swiftly succeeded in taking over the New York baseball universe. The Yankees can only wish they pulled it off.
For now anyway, Francisco Lindor, the effervescent superstar shortstop, becomes the new face of New York baseball. If you want to know why he’s a Met (along with durable high strikeout No. 2 starter Carlos Carrasco) and not a Yankee, the answer is can be summed up in two words:
Giancarlo Stanton.
The Yankees, with major questions about Gleyber Torres at shortstop and a desperate need for a No. 2 starter of Carrasco’s ilk, helplessly watched the Mets fill both of those needs for themselves. It had to kill Brian Cashman to watch the Mets do it with a modest package of players he almost certainly could have topped. If only his hands weren’t financially shackled. Hal Steinbrenner has made it clear: The Yankees are not going to go over the $210 million competitive balance tax this year.
Before arbitration increases for Aaron Judge, Torres, Luke Voit, Gio Urshela, Luis Cessa, Gary Sanchez and Chad Green, they’re already at about $174 million. All of those raises combined will probably bring them to about $199 million. Assuming they re-sign DJ LeMahieu, that’s going to be another $20 million at least, which means they’re going to have to chop payroll (Adam Ottavino’s $9M? Does anyone want Aaron Hicks?) somewhere else.
The problem for the Yankees — which will remain a problem until 2026 — is the $30 million or so they are paying Stanton annually. This winter especially their December 2017 trade for him with Derek Jeter’s Marlins looms as perhaps the dumbest decision they ever made. Because there is no way they would have ever brought in Lindor at around $20M in his free agent walk year — much less make him their third $300 million player — and still signed LeMahieu.
Meanwhile, the lesson of Stanton and the Yankees should not be lost on Steve Cohen. The virtual Lindor trade press conference had not even been set before Mets fans were already clamoring for Cohen to sign George Springer. Conceivably, the 27-year old Lindor is going to command a 9-10 year contract of nearly $300 million, although if I were Cohen I’d still wait to see Lindor play some this season.
Springer, who’s 31, is said to be looking for a similar deal. Rather than saddling himself with another nine-figure deal and hampering his ability to sign other players down the road, better that Cohen spend his remaining “under the threshold” money this winter on more needed pitching and perhaps a far cheaper defensive center fielder like Jackie Bradley Jr.
I suspect Sandy Alderson, who is well aware of the perils of longterm megabucks contracts to players in their 30s, is thinking the same way. From the very beginning of the free agent season when so much speculation had Cohen supposedly pushing for fellow Connecticut resident Springer, Alderson very casually inferred center field was not as much a priority as pitching.
For sure, Alderson and his new GM Jared Porter deserve kudos for pulling off a grand heist of a deal with the financially strapped Indians. Talking to a couple of scouts Friday, they were frankly astounded the Mets were able to land two stars like Lindor and Carrasco for two okay shortstops in Amed Rosario and Andres Gimenez, not even giving up their top shortstop prospect Ronny Mauricio. At the moment, the rest of what the Mets gave up is a couple low-level minor leaguers with minimal upside.
“What I’d like to know,” said one scout, “is how do the Indians make this trade without Dominic Smith in it? Does anyone really think Smith would have been a deal breaker for the Mets to get Lindor? This was a flat-out fleecing on the Mets’ part.”
No doubt Brian Cashman — with a prospective trade centerpiece like Torres and chips like Miguel Andujar and promising young pitchers like Deivi Garcia, Michael King and Domingo German — was probably thinking the same thing.
One of the main reasons the Mets have seemed only passively interested in Springer is that no one is quite sure what the market is for a 31-year old center fielder looking for a $150 millionplus contract, especially in these COVID-19, financially stressed times for the clubs.