The Los Angeles Dodgers offered more money than the New York Yankees for Yoshinobu Yamamoto. The Yankees didn't want to offer more than $300 million for him. But there's more to this decision than just the money.
The Yankees thought $300 million was a good price. They also didn't want to offer a bigger contract than the one they gave to Gerrit Cole in 2020. That contract was for nine years and $324 million.
Yankees decided not to match Dodgers winning $325M bid to Yamamoto because: 1) they thought $300M was right offer, 2) they didn’t believe anyone should have a bigger deal than Gerrit Cole. NYY offered optout after 5 yrs but not a $50M signing bonus. Highly unlikely it mattered.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) December 23, 2023
Maybe the Yankees wanted to show respect to Cole. Or maybe they didn't want to change the standard for how much pitchers get paid. Cole can choose to leave his contract after 2024. If the Yankees were worried about that, they could have fixed it later.
The Dodgers were ready to pay an extra $25 million. The Yankees could have done the same, but they didn't. We'll see if they regret this decision because they could have had another top pitcher.
