Should the Yankees trade fan-favorite pitcher
The New York Yankees have some difficult decisions to make this off-season, especially if they want to make a blockbuster trade for Juan Soto. The San Diego Padres are looking for a starting-level pitching, and the Yankees have a few players they could leverage in a potential deal.
Potential Trade Pieces: Schmidt and Cortes
Right off the bat, Clarke Schmidt emerges as an MLB-ready talent who could support the Padres in 2024, but some may float the idea of moving fan favorite Nestor Cortes, who is coming off an injury-riddled 2023 season.
Cortes still has plenty of value, and while he’s not at his peak stock price following the 2022 season, he is primed for a bounceback and is a solid lefty pitcher who features good stuff. His best season came two years ago when he pitched 158.1 innings, recording a 2.44 ERA and an 82.8 left-on-base percentage that resulted in an All-Star appearance.
Financial Implications for the Padres
This past season, Cortes pitched just 63.1 innings, earning a 4.97 ERA, 69.1% left-on-base rate, and 26.3% ground ball rate. His quality certainly took a hit due to shoulder issues that resurfaced. The 28-year-old still has two more years of control before he becomes a free agent in 2026. His estimated salary in arbitration sits at just $4.6 million, a great number for a team like the Padres who are looking to shed salary and add cheap pitching.
The expectation is that San Diego will have to offload somewhere in the range of $50 million, so getting rid of Soto and his estimated $30 million deal in arbitration and pairing him with Jake Cronenworth, who signed a seven-year, $80 million deal, would allow them to get back into a better financial spot while adding pitching to their team. Of course, losing Soto would be devastating, but they still have Fernando Tatís Jr., Xander Bogaerts, and Manny Machado to lead the way.
