Joining Carton & Roberts on Monday afternoon, Yankees general manager Brian Cashman reiterated what he said about contract negotiations with Aaron Judge when he spoke about the lack of a deal by Friday’s deadline: Judge wants to be a Yankee, and the Yankees want Judge, but just because this deadline passed doesn’t mean the conversations are over.
“I don’t presume anything, because it takes a lot when you’re putting together a trade or coming to contract terms, but we went in with the legitimate intent of coming out (with a long-term deal),” Cashman said. “If you don’t have the outcome you want on the timeline you have, which for us was Opening Day, you still get another bite of the apple. We entered with a legit effort, and now we live to fight another day.”
One thing the GM did clear up, however: he told Judge’s reps last week, before Opening Day, that if no deal was reached, he would open up about the process – something he did by revealing the terms of the team’s final offer, a move Judge seemed to be upset with.
“I would not want to share anything about their side or interest or hopes, other than Judge sharing his intent of wanting to be here for life,” Cashman said, referring to the rumor that Judge wanted an eight-year extension instead of seven, “but I did share with Aaron’s reps that if we didn’t come to an agreement, we’d be sharing our side of the fence, and they were free to do the same. I can’t speak on his feelings either way, but I was transparent publicly and privately in advance of that. Ultimately, the one difficult side of our sport is when the business side is so public. It’s a whole different game, and while there’s a sexy side to it, it’s a game I wish we didn’t have to deal with.”
The two sides first got together “about three weeks before the end of Spring Training,” according to Cashman, and as he mentioned, the team plans to pick things back up this winter once Judge hits free agency – but he’s not averse to revisiting talks during the season, either, if things change, despite the outfielder’s deadline.
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“I wouldn’t say (the deal is off the table),” he said. “We were honest and transparent about trying to do something before the season started and we honored that – but also, it doesn’t mean anything is over. Right now, the expectation is we’ll be talking in winter time, which is when anyone finds their true market value, but my job is to try to look at ways to make the franchise better in the short and long term. He has an agent, so if they want to engage, I don’t have any rules that prevent me from having a conversation if there’s any change in position on either side.”
And as of now, there are no hard feelings, at least on the GM’s side, about how it all unfolded.
“He has his hand on the steering wheel of his life, as he should, and should only do what he feels he is comfortable doing. Conversely, we can control what we offer. Ultimately, the magic happens when people find common ground – sometimes it takes longer, sometimes it doesn’t,” Cashman said.
“We have six more months to go. He’s going to get after it like he always does, and hopefully we’ll talk another time. Bottom line is we’ll all have to reengage at another time, but our intent is to have Aaron Judge, and his intent is to be here.”
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Oh, and before you wonder, no, Judge’s negotiations played no role in in the moves the Yankees did make this offseason (see also: taking on payroll to add Josh Donaldson), nor did they play a role in the Yankees not going after certain free agents the fan base may have wanted, in terms of maybe the Yankees pivoting to a big free agent to try to force Judge into a decision.
“Ultimately, the hope and intent here is to have Judge be part of the future, and to be able to accomplish that, we have to keep some powder dry,” Cashman said. “If we pivoted, that would have ramifications on flexibility as we move forward, and if we decided to place bets elsewhere, it could interfere with those efforts. The Steinbrenner family has stepped up time and time again, and we have the highest payroll in the history of the franchise, well north of that 220 number. We compete for the best players, and we can’t have them all, but we’ve done our fair share of acquiring or retaining some of the best players the sport has ever seen to put out a product on the field our fans will enjoy.”
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