Playoff Result: Lost to Dodgers 4-1 in World Series
Key Free Agents: RF Juan Soto, SP Gerrit Cole (Opt-out), IB Anthony Rizzo, 2B Gleyber Torres, OF Alex Verdugo, RP Tommy Kahnle, RP Clay Holmes, RP Luke Weaver (Club)
There are two ways of looking at Yankees season. An optimist may look at their drastic improvement from their 82-win regular season, as the addition of superstar Juan Soto led to a return to form of one of the league’s best offenses. The pitching rotation also took a step forward with the improvements of Clarke Schmidt and Luis Gil, and the bullpen was stabilized with the savvy pick-up of Luke Weaver. The Yankees claimed the AL’s best record and defeated the Royals and the Guardians in the AL playoffs to advance to their first World Series since 2019.
Most teams, after all, would be thrilled with an appearance in the World Series. Heck, the Seattle Mariners haven’t even made a Fall Classic. Yet the Yankees are no ordinary franchise, and getting soundly defeated in the World Series shouldn’t be cause for celebration. This rings especially true, considering the Yankees had every opportunity to win this series. They were one out away from stealing Game One in Dodger Stadium, and they had a 5-0 lead in Game Five with ace Gerrit Cole on the mound. Those games should both be wins, yet in each instance, the Dodgers delivered the big hit that the Yankees simply couldn’t.
Besides a failure to hit with runners in scoring position, the Yankees were also haunted once again by poor baserunning and terrible fundamentals. In the eighth inning of Game 1, Shohei Ohtani was able to advance to third when Gleyber Torres failed to get in front of a cut-off throw, which allowed Mookie Betts to tie the game with a sacrifice fly. In Game Three, a potential two-out rally was cut short when Giancarlo Stanton was quickly thrown out at home plate on an Anthony Volpe single to the left.
TEO THROWS OUT GIANCARLO WHAT A PLAY #Dodgers pic.twitter.com/jmXylj1yHy
— World Baseball Network (@WorldBaseball_) October 29, 2024
Those mistakes, however, pale in comparison to the avalanche of blunders in Game 5. With nobody out and a runner on first in the fifth, Tommy Edman lined a ball right to Aaron Judge in center field that the sure-fire MVP had just… dropped. The next batter hit a ground ball to Anthony Volpe, who made an excellent play ranging in the hole but short-hopped the throw to Jazz Chisholm. The third baseman couldn’t pick the short-hop, allowing Kiké Hernández to advance safely and loaded the bases with nobody out.
For a moment, it looked like Cole would pull a Houdini act as he struck out Gavin Lux and Ohtani to bring Mookie Betts to the plate with two outs. Betts chopped a ground ball right to first baseman Anthony Rizzo, but Cole inexplicably hesitated to cover the base. Realizing that Cole wouldn’t get there in time, Rizzo attempted to race Betts to the bag himself, but the speedy Dodger right fielder easily won the footrace.
The @Dodgers get on the board in Game 5. #WorldSeries pic.twitter.com/Mif4HgFsoO
— MLB (@MLB) October 31, 2024
The mental lapse got the Dodgers on the board, and the floodgates would open on Cole. World Series MVP Freddie Freeman lined a two-run single into center field, and Teoscar Hernandez followed with a two-run double over Judge’s head in center to tie the game. Though the Yankees managed to temporarily retake the lead in the sixth inning, the Dodgers would scratch out two more runs in the top of the eighth on two singles, a walk, a catcher’s interference, and a pair of sac flies to give them a 7-6 lead they would never relinquish.
As heartbreaking as this World Series was, the Yankees must now turn their attention to the massive collection of talent that just hit free agency. Most important, of course, is the status of Soto. The 25-year-old superstar was as good as advertised in his first season in the Bronx, smashing a career-high 41 home runs while leading the league with 128 runs scored. Unlike his bash brother Judge, Soto kept on hitting right into the postseason, posting a .327/.469/.433 line and sending the Yankees to the World Series with an extra-inning home run against the Guardians in the ALCS.
The Juan Soto bomb that led the #yankees to the World Series!! 🇩🇴🇩🇴🇩🇴 pic.twitter.com/xCCJQmhNnc
— World Baseball Network (@WorldBaseball_) October 20, 2024
However, the issue with Soto’s great season is that it raised his price even further as he enters free agency. All of the major market teams will be in the bidding for his services, including billionaire Steve Cohen and the cross-town rival Mets. Cohen has proven that there’s no limit to his financial muscle, and if the bidding gets into the six-and-seven hundred million like some estimate, the Juan Soto era in the Bronx could be a short one.
As if the possibility of losing a generational hitter after one season wasn’t bad enough, the Yankees also have another third of their lineup, and a pair of key bullpen members headed to free agency. The Yankees will likely see first baseman Anthony Rizzo and outfielder Alex Verdugo depart after career-worst seasons, but the main concern surrounds Gleyber Torres. The second baseman had an up-and-down career in New York but finished strong in 2024 with a .288/.366/.430 line after July 23 and was one of the main offensive contributors during their postseason run. Torres ability to work a walk and get on base in front of Judge, Soto, and Stanton was a key element of the Yankees lineup, and the Bombers will once again be searching for a leadoff man should he depart.
While the Yankees are almost certain to pick up Weaver’s club option for 2025, they are at the risk of losing two other critical relievers to free agency. Tommy Kahnle emerged as the premier set-up man in his second stint in New York, posting a combined 2.38 ERA over the last two seasons. With a changeup that he throws nearly three-quarters of the time, Kahnle is the type of pitcher who can continue to excel even as he enters his age-35 season. And while he is often the subject of criticism among Yankees fans, there is no denying how effectively consistent Clay Holmes has been over the last three seasons. The two-time All-Star has appeared in at least 60 games each year, posted an ERA between 2.54 and 3.14, and struck out at least a batter per inning. Neither pitcher should be especially expensive to re-sign, but there is no understating how valuable they were to the Yankees relief corps over the past two seasons.
Even if the Yankees were to somehow retain every single free agent (and Gerrit Cole opts into the remainder of his contract, as expected), you can’t help feeling that the Yankees missed their best shot at a championship. Besides the fact that they faced an 86-win Royals team in the ALDS and a Guardians team whose starting rotation was decimated by injuries in the ALCS, the Yankees had Stanton, Judge, Cole, and Carlos Rodon healthy for the entire postseason. Each of those players will be at least 32 in 2025, and Cole and Rodon have each showed signs of decline in 2024. Stanton, meanwhile, has topped 120 games just once since 2018 and is now being limited almost exclusively to DH in an effort to keep him on the field. The safest bet appears to be Judge, who had the best season of his career in 2024 and will likely be the unanimous AL MVP. Relying on a 33-year-old to post a 223 OPS+, however, may not be the best strategy for team-building, and we saw in 2023 how quickly the Yankees offense can fall apart if Judge is forced to miss time.
A good way to supplement an aging, injury-prone roster would be with internal additions from the minor leagues, but the Yankees farm system is as weak as it’s been in years. Jason Dominguez will likely replace Alex Verdugo in left field in 2025, but with Spencer Jones having a 200-strikeout season as a 23-year-old in Double-A, the Martian is now the Yankee’s only top-100 prospect. Oswaldo Cabrera, Oswald Peraza, Everson Pereira, and Ben Rice have all failed to make contributions to the big-league club after promising minor-league careers, forcing the Yankees to scramble for external options like Jazz Chisholm at the trade deadline.
The Yankees are not entirely devoid of young talent, but while Volpe, Austin Wells, Luis Gil, and Clarke Schmidt offer plenty of reasons for optimism, they also have a few yellow and even red flags. Volpe has established himself as a Gold-Glove shortstop, but after two consecutive seasons with an on-base percentage below .300 and an OPS well under .700, it is beginning to look unlikely that he will reach his offensive ceiling. Likewise, Wells was one of the best defensive catchers in baseball as a rookie, but his offensive performance cratered down the stretch and was essentially a non-factor in the playoffs. On the pitching side, Gil and Schmidt had their strong first halves derailed by injuries and look more like mid-rotation starters due to their spotty command. Undoubtedly, each of these players can be long-term contributors, but the idea that any can develop into a perennial All-Star caliber player seems unrealistic.
Of course, these are the New York Yankees we’re talking about, and they could make all of this moot by going on a massive spending spree this offseason. The Yankees have been known to throw money at their problems, which satisfies their ravenous fanbase in the short term but doesn’t fix the long-term issues with their roster. The fact is that the Yankees are invested heavily in aging stars without developing enough young talent to pick up the slack. They have been fortunate that Judge, Stanton, and Cole have continued to play well into their mid-30s, but it is only a matter of time before Father Time catches up (he is undefeated after all). With so many players coming off the book and a massive opportunity to re-shape their roster, this offseason is critical to deciding the direction of the Yankees for years to come.
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