Yankees general manager Brian Cashman made a guest appearance on Yankees Hot Stove tonight, talking about the latest and greatest concerning the Bombers’ offseason. Here’s the video in case you missed it. As is his forte, Cashman said a whole lot without saying much at all. That shouldn’t surprise anyone, the guy’s not going to go on television and reveal his deepest and darkest offseason secrets. Anyway, it was certainly an interesting segment, so here’s the highlights…
- Cashman wouldn’t necessarily call his trip to visit Cliff Lee and Co. in Arkansas a “recruiting trip,” though he said he likes to go and meet free agents on their turf. He says he learned that from Pat Gillick, who was an executive with the Yankees a long, long time ago.
- Lee is going to have similar meet-ups with other teams as well, so that wasn’t something that will be unique to Cashman and the Yanks. I can almost guarantee Cash had his 2009 World Series ring on when he was there. Flaunt that sucker and let Lee know what’s coming his way if he chooses New York.
- Cashman emphasized that if he signs a player, Lee or otherwise, he wants it to be on his terms. It was made very clear that this is not a situation where they’ll go all out to sign the lefty, and in fact Cash said it wasn’t a “desperate situation.” They have a limit, and if it doesn’t work out they’ll move on to Plans B, C, D, and so on.
- “I never want to envision Derek Jeter being anything but the New York Yankees’ shortstop,” said the Yanks’ GM. “We met in Tampa on Monday … so the process as started.”
- It wasn’t in the video linked above, but when discussing what Jeter means to the team, Cashman said “Iconic off-the-field value doesn’t translate in my world.” Oh snap. Someone make a t-shirt.
We’ve also got these two notes courtesy of Marc Carig, who I assume spoke to the GM during Joe Torre’s charity even Thursday night…
- Both Mike Harkey and Gil Patterson have interviewed for the vacant pitching coach job, but Cashman expects there to be a larger pool of candidates and presumably many more interviews.
- Cash indicated that he could be in the market for a catcher this offseason, though he wants the youngsters (i.e. Jesus Montero, Frankie Cervelli, and probably even Austin Romine) to compete in Spring Training. It would be nice to see the team bring in a veteran backstop just as insurance, but I suspect they won’t do anything more than sign someone to a minor league deal with an invite to Spring Training. If anything, they have the resources to go out and trade for a catcher during the season.
So that’s that. Another day closer to Spring Training.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.