The Yankees salute their fans.

 

Yep, it's official. Meet your Number Two starter for 2024: Carlos Rotundo.

The final word, at least as reported on SNY, is that the Yankees did not even come in second in the Yoshinobu Yamamoto sweepstakes. Apparently, the Mets matched the Dodgers' $325-million offer, and might have gone higher. 

Word is that Yamamoto wanted a bigger stage than Flushing. And so he shall have one—but not in the Bronx. 

The Yankees now claim they were not really all that hot in pursuit of the Japanese phenom at all. They tell us now that they believed their real need this off-season was to shore up their hitting. 

So they signed one guy. On a rental basis. And now they don't have enough pitching, having dumped six pitchers to acquire an outfield mediocrity who has already flamed out in Boston, and a potential superstar they have under contract for exactly one year. 

The Yankees are like a guy pulling up his socks because they're too short—only to have the toes tear out. Yeah, they fit now.

Is this latest media line for real? Who knows? It's impossible to know what the Yankees' front office is thinking anymore. I don't know if THEY even know what they're thinking.  

What's most astonishing is the great lengths the Yanks went to in order to convince us they were hot in pursuit of YY. Cashman and crew flying out to Japan to watch him pitch (and conveniently missing what promised to be a venom-filled Old-Timer's Day at the Stadium). Presenting him with his No. 18 uniform. Aaron Boone trotted out to tell us what a regular guy he seemed like. 

How many times have we seen this in the past? 

All the stories about how they couldn't sign Manny Machado because they were waiting to sign Carlos Correa but they couldn't sign Carlos Correa because they were waiting to sign Bryce Harper. Last year's infamous, "We're not going to be 'one-and-done'" after they signed Carlos Rodento—and then they were. 

Excuse me. Actually it was more "none and done," considering what El Pauncho turned out to be.

I would compare this to Lucy yanking the football away from Charlie Brown, except that this year, the Yanks ran their usual bait-and-switch too early. I doubt if they have suckered a single extra, season-ticket plan out of the fans so far, and they won't do it now. 

It's more like Lucy lifting the football while the rest of us just stand there watching dull-eyed, asking, "Oh, are we supposed to do something here?"

The Yamamoto bidding war farce was an example of the con man taking the con one step too far, and going back to the same mark one time too many. Instead of getting us to buy in, it has only made the season ahead already seem all the grayer and more hopeless than it already looked.

I don't just mean this in terms of whatever team they finally put on the field—a team that will, I fear, look very much like the team they have now. 

It would be reasonable to say that the bidding for free agents has gotten out of hand. Giving $325 million to Yamamoto is an enormous risk—as was the signing of Ohtani, even with all that deferred money. If the Yankees decided instead to strip their stumbling organization down and rebuild from the bottom up, focusing instead on truly developing players through the system, I wouldn't kick. 

But instead we get more of the same-old, same-old: the Yankees pretending they are going all-out to win, when in fact they are simply trying to hoodwink enough fans into buying the hype again. 

This time, though, I think they don't really understand just what they've done to the franchise. 

There's nothing left, now. No oversold minor leaguers they can string us along with. The Martian has gone home. No next-year's free agent star they can pretend they are saving their money for. Soon, there will be no more string of winning records, no contending for a playoff spot even into July. No legacy of recent championships to remember.

The failure to sign Yamamoto will have long-term consequences for the Yankees' chances of competing.

Can I have a show of hands from all those who think Juan Soto is going to sign a long-term deal with the Yanks, once he has spent the 2024 season running himself ragged chasing the line drives opposing hitters will bang all around the Stadium off our fungal growth of a pitching staff? Yeah, I didn't think so.

But beyond this, their failure has damaged the franchise's brand in ways the Yankees don't even understand. What they said in conceding The Next Big Thing to the Dodgers is that they are no longer one of the big stages in sports. They no longer want to really compete, they are no longer about anything but bringing in the passing, sideshow attraction. 

Mystique and Aura have left the building.