Yankees Managing General Partner & co-Chair Hal Steinbrenner's “recent words and deeds,” including a possible contract extension offer for 2B Robinson Cano, “indicate if not a sea change in his thinking, at least a shift in his perception of how the Yankees should be run,” according to Wallace Matthews of ESPN N.Y. There is “no doubt that a year ago, he was serious about trimming the payroll" to $189M to keep the Yankees "under the new revenue-sharing threshold that kicks in" for the '14 season. But Steinbrenner now “seems to realize that the only bottom line that truly matters with the Yankees is the win-loss record.” The fact that he has “decided to set aside a long-standing team policy” of not offering an extension of an existing contract is a "strong indication that he has decided to go back to doing business" the way his late father George Steinbrenner would have. By "letting Cano know how much he wants him back, Steinbrenner is also letting the rest of baseball know that the sleeping bear is rousing from its nap.” Yankees fans "should be encouraged by the fact that he is at least willing to play the game.” It has recently “become obvious that the expected windfall from the payroll cut ... is likely to be a whole lot less, since three of the teams that had been expected to qualify for revenue sharing (Atlanta, Washington and Toronto) are now expected to be successful at the box office, and thus are no longer eligible for baseball's version of corporate welfare.” Steinbrenner also seems to have "learned what his father instinctively knew: That everyone loves a winner, but nobody likes a finance geek” (ESPNNY.com, 2/20).
