The Yankees’ offseason has gotten off to a quiet start. That fact, in and of itself, is not particularly alarming. The baseball offseason, despite the popular ‘hot stove’ term, rarely moves all that quickly
at first. But when a rival team makes aggressive moves early on, fans start to get antsy. The Blue Jays, who of course took down the Yankees in the playoffs this season, are now claiming the spotlight with their recent pitching acquisitions. They landed big fish Dylan Cease on a seven-year deal, then recently wrangled Cody Ponce, who just turned in an MVP season in the KBO.
So what do you do if you’re the Yankees? You could ignore the fans’ angst to make moves right now and stick to your offseason script, unmoved by your division rivals’ spending spree (which is what will probably happen). Or, you could make a move to appear busy. Like, for instance, signing mid-tier starter Lucas Giolito.
Signing Giolito would not smack entirely of desperation. In fact, it could be a shrewd move for a team that could use an extra starter, but isn’t positively counting on it. But if they did, the Yankees would be holding their noses a bit. The veteran righty who spent last season on the Red Sox put up a respectable 3.41 ERA in 26 starts, while outperforming peripherals that indicated the other shoe was ready to drop.
Of course, Giolito is far from the most appealing starting pitching option on the free market post-Cease. But the top two starters remaining, Framber Valdez and Ranger Suárez, are both lefties. It’s difficult to envision a future in which GM Brian Cashman gives a lucrative free agent contract to a third left-handed starter in four offseasons. After them and NPB star Tatsuya Imai, you start to get into rockier territory. Giolito actually figures to be one of the Yankees’ more realistic targets if they feel compelled to sign a free agent.
Giolito’s 2025 ERA is identical to the one he sported in his 2019 breakout season. But at age 31, he’s just a different pitcher from then. His 19.7 percent strikeout rate marked a steep decline from his peak, and even from his last healthy season, when he bounced across three teams in 2023. That plummeting K rate hasn’t been accompanied with a notable decrease in hard-hit rate or groundball rate either. Additionally, he walks a lot of guys too. He currently occupies an awkward intermediate space, neither a high-whiff fireballer nor a barrel-missing finesse pitcher.
Giolito has mostly been reliable at staying on the field and logging innings, generally ranking somewhere in the top 20 in innings pitched throughout the prime of his career. That picture was complicated when he tore his UCL while building up to the 2024 season and missed the entire year. Then another elbow issue late this season made him unavailable in Boston’s Wild Card Series loss to the Yankees. Giolito says he has already recovered from that injury, but as always with pitchers, those issues never go away entirely.
One point in Giolito’s favor which I think is worth noting: he tended to get better as the game went on last season, in contrast to the current starting pitching trend. While hitters posted a .761 OPS the first time around (which to be clear, should probably improve), that figure dropped to .663 the second time, and further still to .613 the third time in the order. That trend is pretty consistent across his career, too. This is more my own personal speculation, but I think this fact played a big part in Giolito putting up a strong ERA despite all those blinking lights on the dashboard. If he gets in a groove, he can be tough to knock out of the game.
Owing to those subpar peripherals and late-season injury scare, Giolito probably won’t command a ton of term on his deal. MLB Trade Rumors predicts a two-year deal for $32 million, which would be a good bit of business for a veteran arm who may have yet more to give. If the Yankees gave him a comparable deal to make him a fourth or fifth starter or general insurance policy in case of another topline starter injury, it would be hard to protest too much.
But I want to circle back to the fan anxiety aspect that I underlined at the start. Fans get antsy at this time of year, but they also don’t tend to be swayed by depth pickups either. If the Yankees signed a Giolito or player of a similar caliber, the fanbase would inevitably start comparing them to Cease rather than be placated. Therein lies the folly of making a move just to look busy. A reactionary strategy in December rarely helps you win in June, not to mention October. If the Yankees stay quiet, it doesn’t automatically mean they don’t know what they’re doing. After all, signing Lucas Giolito doesn’t automatically mean they know what they’re doing either.
