Replaced, but Yanks gotta try
doom first started to creep into Steinbrenner Field and dominate every conversation, the season at once did a full stop. More than ever, it’s fair to wonder if the Yankees will act like the Yankees of lore and write a check to plug the leak. There are still two splendid options out there after all — old friend Jordan Montgomery and the other Cy Young winner from 2023, Blake Snell.
If you think — as I do — that the Yankees should’ve already welcomed one of those two free agents into the fold, this doesn’t change your mind a bit. The rotation has scads of question marks, and that was with Cole available to lead the charge every five games. Without him as the bellcow ace, everyone else moves up a spot, which is less than ideal. Snell, especially, would ease much of the angst even if, by all indications, you’re not getting near the team-wide influencer you have with Cole.
If you didn’t already think that, though — and their distance well away from Yankees camp is the loudest indication that’s the Yankees’ thinking — it’s hard to believe they should change course now. After all, the Yankees have already offered Snell, though it was far below the value Scott Boras believes he’s worth. And let’s just say that Cole’s status probably didn’t inspire Boras to go into the discount business.
At this point, it seems everyone is approaching this the same: with about as much cautious optimism as the law allows when you hear the words “elbow” and “ElAttrache” in the same sentence.
At this point, it seems the Yankees will look to out-hit teams, which they should be able to do many nights with the Judge-Soto combo sitting in the middle of the lineup every game, and to hope the rotation can make it to whenever Cole’s return date is. Of course, the Yankees also hoped they could outlast Judge’s collision with the Dodger Stadium fence last year and found out different. That injury, like this one, involved not only vacuuming an AllStar player’s production out of the lineup, but siphoning an essential element of the Yankees’ daily DNA, too. They paid for that. Maybe they’ll pay for this. Or maybe it would just make more sense to pay for another pitcher, something they should have done in the first place.