After brutal Frankie Montas news, Yankees expect internal replacements, not a trade

TAMPA -- The Yankees were deflated to learn on Wednesday that Frankie Montas would undergo shoulder surgery -- but the front office does not expect that the setback will lead to the acquisition of another starting pitcher.

According to people with direct knowledge of the team’s thinking, the Yanks’ plan is to lean on internal options like Domingo German and Clarke Schmidt at the back of the rotation. There was no serious internal discussion on Wednesday about a potential trade.

That is in large part because the Yankees have perhaps the best top four in MLB, with Carlos Rodon joining Gerrit Cole, Nestor Cortes and Luis Severino. Cortes is down with a hamstring injury, but both he and the club say that they expect him back by April.

Also relevant is the Yankees’ desire to stay under the $293 million “Steve Cohen tax” threshold. The team only has about $3 million to play with, and is still seeking a left fielder.

In order to sign free agent Jurickson Profar or trade for Pittsburgh’s Bryan Reynolds or Minnesota’s Max Kepler, Yanks GM Brian Cashman would probably have to move salary. The team has long been open to trading Gleyber Torres, who will make $9.6 million this season, but nothing seems close on that front.

Back in December, the Yankees did ask the Mets about Carlos Carrasco ($14 million), but that was when the Mets thought they were signing Carlos Correa and wanted to offload payroll elsewhere. League sources believe that Carrasco came off the market once the Mets’ deal with Correa fell through.

As it stands, German will likely begin the year in the rotation. Plenty of teams patch together the fifth spot in their rotation with a combination of depth starters, openers, and bullpen games, and the Yankees could do the same in the early part of this season before trying to address the rotation at the trade deadline, if necessary.

It helps that Michael King on Wednesday declared himself “100 percent” healed from the fractured elbow that ended his season last July.

King said that he did not know if the Yankees would build him up this spring to serve in a multi-inning role like last year, or make him a short reliever.

According to a team source, the Yanks like King in that multi-inning role and, while they are “still having conversations” about it, the expectation is that King will serve in that capacity again.

After trading three starting pitchers to Oakland for Montas last July -- Ken Waldichuk, JP Sears and Luis Medina -- the Yanks received just 39.2 innings from their prized deadline acquisition. Montas posted a 6.35 ERA for New York, and dealt with shoulder issues from the moment he arrived.

Cashman has a close relationship with Billy Beane, who was still in charge of baseball operations in Oakland last July before later stepping into an advisory role, so there is no ill will between the clubs about New York receiving damaged goods.

But the Yankees would do well to review the process that led their own medical staff to approve the deal.