‘Hurt’ Yankees moving on after Juan Soto departure

FILE–Juan Soto #22 of the New York Yankees walks during the first inning of Game Five of the 2024 World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Elsa/Getty Images/AFP

DALLAS — The New York Yankees wanted to bring Juan Soto back but the organization ultimately saw him depart for a historic 15-year, $765 million deal with the crosstown Mets.

“Ownership and the front office, I think, did everything we could to make it happen,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said during the winter meetings on Tuesday. “It just didn’t happen. But, as I told these guys yesterday, that’s sports.”

Soto’s departure is shocking in many ways. The Yankees made an aggressive push to bring him back and, given their storied history, they don’t lose players they want often.

READ: Juan Soto’s 3-run homer in 10th sends Yankees into World Series

It also leaves a massive hole in their lineup as Soto and Aaron Judge were one of the most dangerous duos in years. Soto batted .288 with 41 home runs and 109 RBIs last season.

It turned out to be his only season in pinstripes after the Yankees acquired him and Trent Grisham from the San Diego Padres for five players, knowing Soto would become an unrestricted free agent after one year.

“Ultimately, Juan earned the right to be in the position that he’s in, and he made a decision that he felt like was best,” Boone said. “We went into this eyes wide open. It was a year ago when we were sitting here, and I remember making the deal at the winter meetings. We knew there was no guarantees of anything moving forward. I think as much as it hurt to make the deal with some of the players that we lost, looking back, I feel like it was the right thing to do and served us well. He had an amazing season obviously with us.

READ: World Series: Aaron Judge is flailing, Yankees sinking along with him

“It kind of hurts in the moment, but when you live in the business and you live in the sport — again, it is sports, it doesn’t always go your way. It’s now an opportunity for us to — and our expectation is to still go out and build and put together a great team to go compete for a championship again next year. That doesn’t stop.”

Sasaki insight

The biggest development during Day 2 was a media scrum with Joel Wolfe, the agent for Japanese phenom Roki Sasaki. Wolfe shed some light into the anticipated pursuit of Sasaki, saying a team from a smaller market with a smaller media pool could be attractive to him.

“I think that there’s an argument to be made that a smaller, mid-market team might be more beneficial for him as a soft landing,” Wolfe said.

Wolfe said the media in Japan had been “very tough” on Sasaki.

Sasaki will draw plenty of interest coming off a season in which he went 10-5 with a 2.35 ERA and 129 strikeouts. And, despite small- to mid-market teams possibly making more sense, it’s still early in the process and big-market teams will make their pitches. Boone didn’t shy away when asked about Sasaki on Tuesday.

“I think there’s no better place to do it than in New York with the pinstripes,” Boone said. “And I think we have a lot to offer him in not only his development, but I think it’s clear we’re talking about a potentially dominant major league starting pitcher.”

Hometown talk

The Texas Rangers were the toast of baseball at the winter meetings a year ago, coming off the franchise’s first World Series championship. They had a frustrating 2024, though, posting a losing record and missing the playoffs.

But the Rangers are confident they can rebound in 2025. The biggest room for improvement may come from within.

“We have a very good core. We won a world championship with these guys,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “Some of them had down years. Silver lining is that it’s hopefully motivating them even more.”

Bochy specifically mentioned Leody Taveras, Adolis Garcia and Jonah Heim as players who are spending the offseason working out at the ballpark.

“These guys are determined to show that last year was a fluke,” Bochy said. “To me, that’s the only way we’re going to get better.”

Could Harper lead off?

Philadelphia Phillies’ Bryce Harper practices before the baseball NL Championship Series against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Sunday, Oct. 15, 2023, in Philadelphia. The Phillies host Game 1 on Monday, Oct. 16. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

Spring training is still weeks away and Opening Day is even further down the road. But it’s never too early to talk about lineups.

Philadelphia Phillies manager Rob Thomson was asked about Bryce Harper moving into the leadoff role like Shohei Ohtani with the Dodgers and Francisco Lindor with the Mets. Harper has batted leadoff in 38 games in his career, the last coming in 2022. He batted third exclusively last season.

But Thomson acknowledged it is something he’s thought about.

“That’s something that would be a long conversation, I think,” he said. “I’m not sure Bryce would be willing to go there. I think the more at-bats you get for the best hitters, the better chances you have. That’s the idea behind it.”

Defining success

The Chicago White Sox made history for the wrong reasons in 2024, losing a record 121 games. First-year manager Will Venable has been brought in to help rebuild the organization after spending the past two seasons with the Rangers being groomed for this type of job by Bochy.

Still, what will success look like? A 20-win improvement would still translate to a 100-loss season.

“Obviously wins and losses matter, and we’ll all be judged on that,” Venable said. “It’s also about our players and did we support them to get better? Did they get better and continue to develop? Then did we do the things internally with our infrastructure and our systems and processes to set us up for success in the future, too? There’s a lot of work being done behind the scenes.

“So I think all those are fair measures of our success.”