Pirates teammate reportedly ignites bizarre Paul Skenes-Yankees trade buzz

It's a bizarre game of telephone, sure, but right now, it's all we have linking Paul Skenes to the New York Yankees in nebulous trade talks of the future. Given where we're at in the offseason, that's more than enough to dream on.

We at least know one thing, in the moment: Ben Cherington hates to see Randy Miller coming. Miller, who got everybody riled up on Tuesday night by being the first to indicate that Brian Cashman wouldn't be joining his fellow GMs in Las Vegas, reportedly approached Cherington with a quote attributed to an anonymous Pirate in an ambush.

Per Miller, he's got one of Skenes' Pirates teammates on record that the right-hander has said "multiple times" he'd like to play for the Yankees. That won't happen until the end of the 2029 season, unless the Pirates pivot from their current insistence that the soon-to-be Cy Young winner isn't going anywhere.

Skenes, in this moment, is the Pirates' meal ticket and the sole reason to believe that, with a couple of bats and a couple of development success stories, Pittsburgh's sky really could be the limit. The Pirates locker room may not be similarly bought into that belief system.

Randy Miller claims an anonymous Pirates teammate says Paul Skenes wants to be traded to the Yankees

Of course, all of this should be taken with a maximum number of grains of salt. Miller's reputation is hardly rock solid, and everything mentioned here is attributed to telling a friend to tell a friend that Paul Skenes thinks the Pirates' front office smells.

Still, it would be hard to claim with any confidence that the Pirates' front office is operating with proper urgency. They certainly aren't operating with heightened financial limits; the three-year, $26 million contract they bequeathed upon Ivan Nova at the end of the 2016 season is still one of the largest deals they've ever doled out in free agency. Bryan Reynolds' eight-year, $106.75 million broke the mold in terms of their recent extensions; Skenes will command triple that today, as well as a defined commitment to excellence.

Skenes in pinstripes, seeking a winning environment? Of course it sounds like a reasonable dream someday. Skenes repeatedly telling his Pirates teammates that, after Year 2, he's already made up his mind about finding his way to the Bronx? Sounds unlikely — and, honestly, it probably hurts the Yankees' chances that Ben Cherington is already having to fend off this type of nonsense from the New York media.