Robinson Cano was introduced today in Seattle after signing a 10-year, $240 million contract, matching the fourth biggest contract ever. The newest Mariner wasted no time taking shots at the Yankees pursuit of him.“I didn’t feel respect. I didn’t get any respect. I didn’t see any effort. We never got to the point where there was close commitment to anything,” Cano said of New York.
It’s ironic Cano talks about effort here, since he shows so much of it day in and day out.
The Yankees offered Cano a seven-year, $175 million contract, and its offer never changed throughout the process. How disrespectful the Yankees must be for refusing pay so much for a player when they’re going to be 38, 39 and 40?
If anyone wasn’t showing respect, it was Cano who has the audacity to say he was disrespected when the Yankees offered him an average of $25 million per year for seven years, which was more money annually than he is making with Seattle. Cano acknowledged that in an interview with ESPN’s Pedro Gomez.
Not only that, Cano immediately grew out his beard — sticking it to the Yankees tradition of everyone being clean shaven.
Maybe if Cano wasn’t a .222 career postseason hitter, maybe if he didn’t have an 0-26 streak in the ALCS, maybe if he didn’t have a career .267 postseason on-base percentage, maybe if he ran hard all the time on the base paths, the Yankees would have given him the extra years he was seeking.
In comparison, Derek Jeter’s career postseason on-base percentage is .374, over 100 points higher than Cano. New Yorkers judge players on how they perform on the biggest stage, and Cano hasn’t shown he can deliver when the games really matter.
So Robinson, enjoy your decade in Seattle where maybe, just maybe, you might make the playoffs.
