Marcus Stroman’s Yankees price was right for wrong reasons

Marcus Stroman is still just 32. He is a very good pitcher in a market eagerly willing to give very good 32 year old starters more than two years and more than $37 million guaranteed. In a vacuum, there would have been a financial war for Stroman’s services. That there wasn’t screams what a distressed asset Stroman has become.

That the Yankees agreed to that deal pending a physical speaks to what a distressed outfit they’ve become, too, as the Bronx Home For Wayward Players. If this were a math equation it would read: desperation plus desperation equals strange bedfellows. The last time the Yankees strongly believed they were going to sign a star from Japan and were instead rejected as they were with Yoshinobu Yamamoto was six years ago.

Shohei Ohtani didn’t even make them one of his seven finalists. The Yankees reacted by quickly pivoting to a trade for Giancarlo Stanton, which has turned out to be ill fated. They were not as rash this time. First, they heard the unsettling prices for Dylan Cease in a trade and Blake Snell in free agency .

They learned all things being equal Jordan Montgomery probably does not want to be a Yankee again. Wherever else they looked the cost or the medical or the projection was not tempting, causing the Yanks to further bemoan not getting Yamamoto — their first, second and third pitching choice this offseason.

So they ultimately decided they had to get on the board with another veteran starter they believed capable of 150 quality innings. And the price was right with Stroman. But that price is a statement. Remember that in this market, Frankie Montas received $16 million for one year and Stroman — an All Star last season — agreed to $18.5 million per for two years.

The industry spoke loudly — and not on what it thought of Stroman the pitcher. Among Stroman’s many questionable acts on social media was a feud he extended with Brian Cashman after the Yankees did not acquire him in 2019. The general manager said Stroman wasn’t a “difference maker” and would be a postseason reliever as a Yankee.

So let’s not exonerate Cashman who fueled this. He actually could have used Stroman for that postseason rotation and ultimately — if my memory is correct — did not acquire the righty because he was not yet ready to give up Clint Frazier. But not letting stuff go on social media and making bad so much worse is part of Stroman’s repertoire.

Interestingly, he scrubbed that social media history during this negotiating season. And I fully expect Cashman and Stroman to find public detente for mutual self interest (I can’t wait to hear about the great one on one dinner they had at blah, blah, blah). I do remember that the Yankees despised Roger Clemens up to the moment they acquired him in February 1999.

Derek Jeter particularly had distaste for Clemens’ chin music ways, but on the first day batters faced pitchers that spring, Jeter and Chuck Knoblauch came out in full catching gear to bat against Clemens. Everyone laughed. All went pretty well. After the Yanks lost the 2001 World Series, they reunited with David Wells, though Cashman and Joe Torre liked him as much as influenza.

But those teams had a great leadership infrastructure, a championship pedigree and an abundance of professional adults. The current Yankees don’t. They have never fully replaced the leadership of CC Sabathia and Brett Gardner — which is needed since the Yanks are adding Stroman and Alex Verdugo to Carlos Rodon in trying to own the Worst Actor category in 2024.

Perhaps after the disappointment of last season and the reality of the reputations everyone will be on his best behavior and — more important — play their best. Winning is the great deodorant. And Stroman is a very good pitcher. An athletic, fierce ground ball machine. He offers more certainty behind Gerrit Cole and in addition to the dubious Rodon and Nestor Cortes.

This pushes Clarke Schmidt to a No. 5 starter and Will Warren and Clayton Beeter to depth, all while allowing the Yanks to now more comfortably see if prices fall on Cease and/or Snell or someone else to further burnish this go for it squad. All for a price that was right with Stroman — for too many wrong reasons..