LAS VEGAS – Baseball’s perennial high-rollers, the
New York Yankees, scored the biggest coup of the winter meetings when
CC Sabathia reached preliminary agreement on a deal that will pay him $161 million over the next seven years.
The deal, according to a source close to negotiations, gives Sabathia the right to opt out of the contract after the first three years of the contract, by which time he will have been paid $69 million. Sabathia had insisted on the clause to satisfy concerns he had about playing in New York.
There has been no official confirmation of the deal. An official announcement is not expected until after Sabathia passes a physical, which he is expected to undergo in New York within the next couple of days.
The New York Post was the first to report that Yankees GM Brian Cashman got his man after visiting Sabathia and his wife, Amber, in San Francisco, the third straight day Cashman had met with the 28-year-old left-hander.
Sabathia’s coming to terms could signal the start of some serious dealing the next several day, with the Yankees also heavily in the market for at least one more free-agent starter from the top-tier list of
A.J. Burnett,
Derek Lowe and
Ben Sheets. The Yankees are facing strong competition from Atlanta for Burnett, while the Phillies and possibly the Red Sox remain players for Lowe.
Sabathia now tops a rotation that will also have
Chien-Ming Wang back from injury and the emerging
Joba Chamberlain. The Yankees also are trying to persuade veteran
Andy Pettitte to come back for another year.
And while the Yankees’ primary focuse remains pitching, there is the possibility that Cashman, flush with cash, could also pose a run at
Mark Teixeira, though the
Boston Red Sox and
Los Angeles Angels are the front-runners for the switch-hitting first baseman.
The Yankees’ offer – with Cashman adding a year and $20 million to the original six-year, $140 million proposal the Bombers made weeks ago – eroded whatever preference Sabathia had to remain on the West Coast. With the Yankees having missed the playoffs for the first time after 13 straight appearances, Cashman was under pressure to show that he could still deliver the biggest prize on the market.
Another factor was that no West Coast team had made Sabathia an offer, a fact that must have weighed on him as the Yankees made their full-court press. The
Milwaukee Brewers, who Sabathia led to the playoffs after a mid-season trade from the
Cleveland Indians, were the only other team to make him an offer.
