Last spring, there were reports of the Yankees discussing an extension with Dellin Betances before his shoulder issue happened, keeping him out of the entire 2019 season aside from facing (and striking out) two batters in September. In what was his first time to finally cash in on being the best reliever in baseball over the last five years, Betances had a season-crushing shoulder injury followed by a season-ending Achillies injury.

You can’t help but feel bad for a guy who has done nothing other than dominate the late innings of Yankees games while relievers of much lesser ability have signed eight-figure deals, and when it was his chance at one of those eight-figure deals, it was taken away from him. No, Betances isn’t hurting for money, given the the $16.7 million he has made in his major league career, but that total represents close to what he would be getting per season now if not for the injuries. Over the five previous seasons, Betances appeared in 349 games, pitching 373 1/3 innings with 607 strikeouts, a 2.22 ERA and a 1.108 WHIP, allowing just 5.3 hits-per-nine innings with an astounding 14.6 strikeouts-per-nine. Absolutely ridiculous numbers from the best reliever in baseball.

Betances has been my favorite Yankee since Number 2 retired and as a native New Yorker and homegrown prospect who has always said and done the right things, it’s hard not to like him (unless you’re Randy Levine). He was the lone consistent bright spot in the dark years of 2014-16 and pitched in every role asked of him for both Joe Girardi and Aaron Boone. He deserved better than to have his free agency ruined and now he deserves better than settling for a one-year or rebuilding deal somewhere other than the Bronx.

The Yankees put themselves up against or over the third luxury-tax threshold by signing Gerrit Cole, depending on what happens with trying to move J.A. Happ’s ill-advised contract and $17 million 2020 salary and the Jacoby Ellsbury contract grievance, which most likely won’t be resolved for a long, long time. But after going out and getting “their guy” in Cole for the first time since they signed CC Sabathia 11 years ago, the Yankees can’t now go back to their penny-pinching ways which cost them several championship opportunities over the last decade. If the Yankees want to put together the best possible roster for 2020, that roster includes Betances.

There’s no reason for the Yankees to not sign Betances. Believing they don’t need him because they have Aroldis Chapman, whose declining velocity and control and inability to put away hitters is frightening, Zack Britton, whose control is a real problem and isn’t who he once was, Adam Ottavino, who helped ruin the ALCS, Tommy Kahnle, who is a year removed from spending the season in the minors, or Chad Green, who was demoted last season for the worst stretch of relief appearances possibly ever, is more than risky. The Yankees might not need their excessive abundance of elite relievers on days when Cole pitches, but they’re still going to need them when James Paxton (less than 5 1/3 innings per start in 2019), Masahiro Tanaka (just over 5 2/3 innings per start in 2019), Luis Severino (will be coming off season-long shoulder and lat injuries) and Jordan Montgomery (will be returning from Tommy John surgery) pitch. (Or Happ if they’re unable to move him). The Yankees’ bullpen is deeper, better and more stable than any other bullpen in baseball, but that’s all the more reason to make a strength stronger. They might not need their bullpen to win the division and beat up on what will once again be a mostly non-competitive league, but they will need it to win in October, as we once again just saw. Having to watch someone Tyler Lyons or Luis Cessa enter a playoff game because the Yankees are one elite reliever too short to get 27 outs in the postseason isn’t something I want to see.

It won’t surprise me if the Yankees let Betances sign elsewhere. Giving Cole $324 million means they have to cut costs in other places, even though they truly don’t. Not signing Betances because it’s a chance to save a few dollars with the idea Jonathan Holder or Ben Heller or some other fringe major leaguer can fill a bullpen role is a mistake. After signing Cole, I thought the Yankees were done making obvious mistakes. Not signing Betances would be an obvious mistake.

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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

At some point, enough would be enough. At some point Hal Steinbrenner would grow tired of issuing an apology to Yankees fans at the end of each season for coming up short and failing to deliver a championship. That point ended up being 10 years without a championship, four ALCS losses over a decade and the continued unsuccessful strategy of playing every October game by planning for 15 outs from the bullpen. That’s the point when the Yankees decided to act like the the Yankees again and throw around their financial might the way they used by giving Gerrit Cole a nine-year, $324 million contract.

It didn’t take long for the outcry of a starting pitcher getting paid through age 38 at $36 million per season, and it didn’t take long for some to assume the Yankees would eventually regret the deal. But they will only regret it if nine years from now they haven’t won a championship since 2009. Otherwise, there won’t be any regret. The goal is to win championships. Not worry about the financial state of the team and whatever the luxury tax will be in baseball in 2028. And the goal certainly isn’t to worry about the state of the Steinbrenners’ bank account. If the Padres can afford $300 million contracts, the Yankees can more than afford $324 million contracts. This move in no way inhibits the team from necessary future moves, the same way $324 million didn’t inhibit them from this necessary move.

And this move was necessary. The Yankees had to have Cole. They had to. They couldn’t waste another season of this current championship window by being content with four innings from their starting pitchers in October. They couldn’t waste another season debating what the order of their rotation should be for the postseason because they didn’t have a true No. 1. They couldn’t sit by and let yet another superstar free agent sign elsewhere.

Somewhere along the way the Yankees started caring about three and four and five seasons down the road. It’s why the last time they went out and successfully got the guy they wanted and the guy everyone thought they would get was 11 years ago when they outbid themselves to pull CC Sabathia away from California and put him into pinstripes. It took the Yankees not wanting Justin Verlander’s salary in August 2017, cutting payroll by $50 million for 2018 after coming within a game of the 2017 World Series and not wanting to go an extra year on Patrick Corbin, but the Yankees finally changed course and signed the best available free-agent starting pitcher, crushing both the average annual salary and total salary records for a pitcher.

The Yankees did what they used to do and signed the guy everyone expected them to. The Yankees have their ace, but more importantly, the Yankees are back to acting like the Yankees.

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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

Nine years ago tomorrow, I slipped into a deep and long depression. Not because it was winter and freezing cold or because the Rangers were wasting Henrik Lundqvist’s prime with a bad defense and mediocre roster or because the Giants would soon suffer the Meltdown at MetLife against the Eagles to ruin their season or because I still wasn’t over the ALCS loss to the Rangers. I became depressed because Cliff Lee turned down the Yankees.

At the time, the first month-plus of free agency had been reported as a mere formality and Lee signing with the Yankees was deemed inevitable. They needed him. They desperately needed him, and after failing to successfully trade for him in July of that season and having the ALCS swung against them because of it, they weren’t going to be stopped. Lee was going to be a Yankee and after beating them in Games 1 and 5 of the 2009 World Series and Game 3 of the 2010 ALCS, he was going to help them win games in October rather than help them lose.

I still remember seeing Jon Heyman’s tweet of a “mystery team” suddenly being involved in the Lee sweepstakes. The term “mystery team” has haunted me since that day and even the word “mystery” still bothers me. Eventually, the mystery team would be revealed as the Phillies and Lee was going back to Philadelphia even though the team had screwed him over by sending him to baseball Siberia in Seattle the prior offseason after trading for Roy Halladay. The Phillies’ offer was for five years and $120 million. It was less than the Rangers’ six-year, $138 million offer and much less than the Yankees’ six-year, $148 million offer with a player option for a seventh year at $16 million. I wrote this reactionary blog at the time with tears streaming down my face.

Lee was the one that got away … twice. Brian Cashman’s unwillingness to include Eduardo Nunez in the July 2010 deal for Lee (only to release Nunez in the spring of 2014) allowed Texas to swoop in and get him, and Lee not caring about taking substanially less money and years to pitch for a team which had shipped him away left the Yankees standing empty-handed. Maybe Andy Pettitte doesn’t briefly retire after the 2010 season if the Yankees land Lee, and the team has a rotation of CC Sabathia in his prime, Lee in his prime, Phil Hughes coming off an 18-win, All-Star season, Pettitte and A.J. Burnett. Unfortunately, Lee went to the Phillies, Pettitte did retire and the Yankees turned to Freddy Garcia’s smoke-and-mirrors act and gave Bartolo Colon a chance to ressurect his career. Miraculously, Garcia and Colon were good enough for long enough and Ivan Nova emered as a major-league starter for the Yankees to reach the postseason, but once the Yankees got to October, Colon wasn’t allowed to start, Garcia was ineffective and Nova pitched like you would expect a rookie to pitch in the playoffs. (The Yankees’ inability to hit with runners in scoring position, especially in Game 5 also played a big role in their first-round elimination.)

This offseason, an offseason followed by the exact six-game ALCS loss nine years ago (win Game 1 on the road, lose Game 2 on the road, lose Game 3 at home, lose Game 4 at home, win Game 5 at home, lose Game 6 on the road), the Yankees have a chance to sign another starting pitcher who has already gotten away twice.

Nearly a month ago, I wrote Don’t Expect the Yankees to Sign Gerrit Cole. I wrote it because why would Yankees fans expect the team to sign the most-coveted free-agent pitcher this offseason when he would likely command the most money of any pitcher in history? It’s not 11 years ago when the Yankees offered CC Sabathia a record-breaking contract on the first day of free agency and continued to outbid themselves to persuade him away from his home of California and put him in pinstripes, and it’s not nine years ago when they made the highest offer to Lee. The Yankees don’t operate the way they did a decade ago, and they have 10 years of mixed results to show for it.

The Yankees were unwilling to take on Justin Verlander’s salary at the 2017 waiver deadline, and he single-handedly swung the 2017 ALCS in the Astros’ favor by winning Games 2 and 6. After coming within a game of the 2017 World Series, the 2018 Yankees’ payroll was cut by $50 million. After falling short again in 2018 because of their starting pitching, the Yankees were unwilling to give Patrick Corbin an additional year on his offer and he ended up in Washington. The Yankees have had several chances to drastically upgrade their rotation either through free agency or a trade over the last three seasons and they have come up short each time, unwilling to offer enough money or unwilling to depart with their prospects. Combine all of this with the front office thinking starting pitching isn’t why they lost in the ALCS again, and you will understand why no Yankees fan could think it’s a given they would make a realistic run at Cole this winter.

That has all changed over the last week with the Yankees flying across the country to meet with Cole followed by reports the Yankees won’t be denied by the ace and that the team has either offered or is prepared to offer Cole a seven-year, $240 million contract, breaking both the average annual salary and total contract records for a starting pitcher. I have gone from accepting a rotation of Luis Severino, James Paxton, Masahiro Tanaka, Jordan Montgomery and J.A. Happ to now accepting nothing short of Cole in the rotation. The reports of the Yankees finally remembering they’re the Yankees after years of counting their pennies and nickel-and-diming their way to a 10-year World Series drought appears to be over has made me believe in the Yankees’ financial prowess again. It has made me believe they are done wasting seasons and opportunities in this current championship window.

The Yankees missed out on Lee twice. Once because they were overvalued their prospects and once because he turned down their offer.

The Yankees have already missed out on Cole twice. Once because they drafted him despite knowing he wanted to attend college and once because they didn’t want to part with Miguel Andujar or Clint Frazier. They can’t miss out on him a third time. They can’t.

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My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!