The Yankees, currently in last place, have failed to build a winner around Aaron Judge in the last six yearsAfter going to Game 7 of the ALCS in 2017, the Yankees were in an enviable position. They had an MLB roster with a lot of young talent (Judge, Severino, Sánchez, Greg Bird, Jordan Montgomery, etc.), Baseball America's second-ranked farm system, and as little money on the books as at any point in recent memory. Alex Rodriguez's and Mark Teixeira's contracts had expired and CC Sabathia's big-money years were over. The Yankees had young talent and money to spend. It was an exciting time.
The missteps began in 2018, the year after the Yankees fell one win short of a World Series berth. That season Yankees ownership, led by chairman Hal Steinbrenner, ordered payroll to come under the $195 million competitive balance tax threshold. The competitive balance tax, or CBT, is MLB's soft salary cap. It is intended to discourage runaway spending. Yankees ownership wanted to get under the CBT threshold to reset their tax rates since they had been a multiple time offender.
In English, that means the Yankees cut payroll in 2018. They cut payroll rather significantly. Here are the team's CBT payrolls during the five-year period from 2016-20, per Cot's Baseball Contracts.
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www.cbssports.com]
