SAN ANTONIO -- Yankees general manager Brian Cashman addressed reporters upon arriving at the annual GM Meeting, mostly about the team’s decision not to add an extra year to ace Gerrit Cole’s contract, and Cole’s decision to opt back into that agreement.
Over the weekend, Cole exercised that opt-out clause, which the Yankees could void by adding an additional year at $36 million. Instead, the sides agreed to essentially reverse the opt-out decision and remain together for another four years.
As there were no cameras permitted at Cashman’s briefing, here is a large portion of what he said.
Q: Can you take us through how you got to the Cole decision today?
Brian Cashman: Yeah, obviously Gerrit exercised his opt-out. We had a lot of conversations. [Yankees owner] Hal Steinbrenner obviously involved every step of the way, with me and [Cole's agent] Scott Boras, [Yankees president] Randy Levine and Gerrit Cole, himself. And certainly, I'd say, playing a little bit into the time frame of us getting through the World Series and having, you know, a 48-hour window to try to make a decision on whether we'd put a fifth year on there. During our conversations we were having, it was something, at the moment, we weren't necessarily comfortable doing, but we wanted our player and our ace back, and he certainly didn't want to go, either, at the same time.
And so we had a lot of healthy dialogue about trying to just thread the needle and just keep it in play. And we could always talk further as we move forward about the future because the intent when we signed Gerrit would be leading our staff till the end of his career. And so ultimately we currently have in place, you know, the contract that we signed him to that takes him through, I think, what, [age] 37? His... career hopefully will finish with the Yankees. Whether that’s at the end of this contract or anything in the future we can still talk through that. But the most important thing is, the biggest first step is, we have our ace back, and we're excited about that.
Q: You said you weren't comfortable just adding that fifth year. Can you speak to why you guys felt that way?
Cashman: It was a 48-hour window, very small. We just -- it feels like he legitimately just got off the mound, and we were in our discussions, our verbal discussions. We were wrestling with it and sharing that. And at the same time, there was an opportunity that arose, that Gerrit didn't want to go anywhere, either. And so the one thing that was certain during the discussions with Scott, with Gerrit, with Hal, with myself, with Randy Levine, is that all parties wanted to keep the relationship going. And so the pressure point was the time frame we're in and the window we're in. So we removed the time frame by rescinding the option that both parties had all together and having the remaining four years remain in place, and that was, at least, you know, in the short term, the easiest solution to the pressure point of the problem of the time frame.
Q: If he wanted to stay, why didn't he just opt-in?
Cashman: You mean, not opt-out? I can't speak for that.
Q: But you just spoke to it. You said he wanted to stay. You guys could have, at the end of it, said, ‘Well, now you're not staying,' right?
Cashman: But we didn't want that. So I can only speak on my end, so I can only show you how things played out. So on my end, and on our end, on behalf of the Yankees, we certainly wanted him to be with us as we moved forward, and he is. And during the conversation, it was clear, too, that that's still what he wanted regardless. And so the easy solution was to rescind the options.
Q: Did you get too deep into talking about different extension options for him prior to today's deadline? Was there a possibility at one point you would have come up with a different contract structure redo?
Cashman: In the time frame that wasn't going to be feasible.
