The Cheap New York Yankees Plan On Taking Luis Severino To Arbitration Court Over Less Than a Million Dollars

I hate arbitration and the tension it creates when players and front office figures (cough, cough Randy Levine) don’t agree on numbers and have to take the dispute to trial.

Quick aside: Imagine not watching sports and trying to comprehend we got to trial to figure out athletes’ contracts. Someone wants $5 million, but the team wants to pay $3 million, well, we’re going to trial. We’re going to debate baseball stats in court to decide millions of dollars for a player. The concept of that would fry a non-sports fan’s brain.

Okay, we’re back. This sort of thing happened with Dellin Betances famously back in 2017 when he wanted $5 million and was only awarded $3 million in court. Yankees team president Randy Levine said they wouldn’t give him the extra money because Dellin wasn’t a “closer.” Randy said that would be like calling him an astronaut even though he’s just the Yankees president. It was ugly, and it definitely hurt Dellin’s relationship with the team moving forward. This offseason Dellin and the Yankees agreed on a one year deal for a little over $7 million. Rightfully deserved for a dude who has put up nothing by elite numbers in his five full years in pinstripes. Next year he’ll be a free agent and it will be very interesting how the Yankees deal with a long term contract with him.

Now to this year’s dilemma: Luis Severino. Sevy, our ace, is asking for $5.25 million while the Yankees refuse to budge off of $4.4 million. This is Severino’s first year being arbitration eligible and the only starting pitcher to exceed $6 million in their first year was Dallas Keuchel, who had just won the Cy Young. The Yanks can’t just go to $5 million and make everyone happy? MLB Trade Rumors (very, very good at projecting salaries) has Sevy at $5.1. The Yanks are lowballing their best young arm who has the potential to be the ace of this staff for the next seven or so years. But why? It’s less than a million dollar difference. For Christ’s sake they project Sonny Gray to make $9.1 million. Just pay the guy and make him happy. If you really wanted to get into sabremetrics to show you how good Sevy has been, over the last two seasons he has compiled an fWar of 11. That equates to $91 million of worth. He’s 24 years old and only going to get better. I’m not buying last year’s second struggles. I’m not. Sevy went back to the lab this offseason and is going to come into spring training a new man. It doesn’t matter who the Yankees add, they need Sevy to be at the top of his game if it means a World Series championship. Make the man happy, and give him what he wants. It’s such a bad look for the organization to take this to court. This man has given us nothing but electricity over the last two seasons.