How Do The Yankees Handle Carlos Beltran After 2014?

Carlos Beltran. Just hearing his name changes your mood. I’m often reminded of Randy Johnson when I think about Beltran. He’s a guy the Yankees signed a decade after they should have. Instead, the Yankees waiting until his age-37 season to sign him to a three-year, $45 million dollar contract. As expected, the miles on Beltran’s body have piled up to the point that he is not an everyday baseball player.

Beltran had some fantastic numbers with his most recent team, the St. Louis Cardinals. Just last season he hit .296 in 145 games with 24 home runs and 84 RBI. He had an OPS of .830 and his strikeout numbers were also way down from 2012. This season he’s down to .239 with 15 home runs and 48 RBI in 101 games, and owns a .719 OPS. These numbers are certainly respectable for a 37-year-old player with a cheap or at least moderate contract. However, this is just year 1 of three years at $15 million per year. There is no value in this contract, especially when considering that of his 101 games, 72 of them have been at the DH spot. Unlike most teams, the Yankees use the DH to rest its stars in rotation. Without it, the entire lineup is affected.

Beltran’s contract is untradeable. At his age, with his injuries, with the amount of money left, it will be ours until the final day of the 2016 season. He is going in for elbow surgery in the offseason. Hopefully that will get him back to his 2013 numbers. More realistically, the Yankees need to act like he is not a member of the team and go out to get a new starting right fielder this off-season. If it turns out that Beltran comes back strong and there is a fight for who plays in right, that’s fantastic. The Yankees would much rather have 4 outfielders than two.

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This season, Beltran has definitely sent the Yankees scrambling for pieces they did not expect to have to have. Ichiro Suzuki has been a blessing in right. He obviously is not the player he once was either, but without him the team wouldn’t even be in playoff contention. Beltran cannot fool the Yankees two years in a row.