We’ve now hit the second week of spring training, and the reigning NL Cy Young winner still doesn’t have a team. Blake Snell’s free agency has been at a standstill for months now, and with just over a month until Opening Day, that appears to still be the case: Per MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand and USA Today’s Bob Nightengale, the New York Yankees have an offer on the table for Snell, but that offer is well below Snell and agent Scott Boras’ price range.
Team and player locked in a game of chicken, with the Yankees waiting to see whether a cold market will convince Snell to either come closer toward their reported five-year, $150 million offer or decide to take a short-term deal in the $35 million range. Until one side blinks, however, don’t expect much of any momentum:
As of yesterday, there wasn’t a sense at Yankees camp that the team was close to adding Blake Snell. A few people in the know said there hadn’t been momentum lately. No one is saying it’s impossible, but that was the tone yesterday
— Andy Martino (@martinonyc) February 19, 2024
New York isn’t the only team that remains interested in Snell. Both the Los Angeles Angels and San Francisco Giants have money to spend, a need for pitching and a desire to contend in 2024, though it’s unclear whether they or anyone else have made Snell a firm offer at this point. But L.A. is just beginning what figures to be a long and painful rebuild, while San Francisco has been unwilling to shell out big money to free agents in their 30s. It’s simply not as robust a market as Snell likely hoped for, and it could come to pass that the Yankees’ offer — considering both the financial terms and the chance at contention right away — is the best one the lefty can get.
After missing out on Yoshinobu Yamamoto, the Yankees quickly pivoted and signed Marcus Stroman to a two-year contract. But given the question marks around Carlos Rodon and Nestor Cortes right now, the starting pitching picture is hardly settled. Cortes, Rodon, and Stroman all missed time with injury last year, and Clarke Schmidt set a new career high by more than 60 innings. New York is all-in on winning big in their one guaranteed year with Juan Soto — “hell-bent on being a champion,” per manager Aaron Boone — and doing so would require getting a lot more from their rotation than they got last season.
When he’s on, Snell is as good as it gets: The 31-year-old posted a 2.25 ERA with 234 strikeouts in 180 innings last year, allowing just 19 runs over his final 23 starts en route to winning his second Cy Young Award with the San Diego Padres. His age, iffy command and uneven track record — he pitched to a good-not-great 3.85 ERA in the four seasons between his two Cy Young campaigns — have scared teams off the sort of megadeal he expected, however.
The Yankees also surrendered four pitchers, including three who appeared in the Majors last season, to acquire Soto in December. There’s still some upper-Minors pitching depth, namely prospects Clayton Beeter and Will Warren, but both of those options are still unproven — and if the 2023 Yankees taught us anything, it’s that you can never have enough arms.
It should be noted that New York’s competitive balance tax payroll is currently north of the $297 million threshold (i.e. the “Steven Cohen tax”). Since this is their third year over the CBT threshold, every dollar over $297 million is taxed at 110%. So, for example, if the Yankees sign Snell to a contract that pays $35 million a year, it would cost them an additional $38.5 million in tax in 2024. As the start of the season nears, we’re about to find out just how much Hal Steinbrenner is willing to spend to erase the memory of last year’s 82-80 finish — or whether Snell can find big bucks elsewhere.
