Yankees News: Jeff Passan weighs in on Ohtani, Yamamoto, Bellinger chances for NY

The clock's ticking. The World Series is set. The offseason will officially begin in a couple of weeks. Are the New York Yankees ready? Honestly, we do not know. The audit still has not taken place. Changes still haven't been made. No approach to free agency or the trade market has been divulged.

The silence has been deafening, and it's getting fairly exhausting exclusively hearing chatter from Yankees insiders. Anybody from the general baseball community care to weigh in? It's not that we don't trust those closest to the Yankees, but we'd prefer a mix of insight and reports.

Well, hey! We finally got one! Except it's ... not very helpful? As reliable and knowledgable as ESPN MLB insider Jeff Passan is, we can't say he gave Yankees fans too much about their offseason plans as it pertains to Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Cody Bellinger.

It's more of the same, which leads us to believe the Yankees are keeping everything as close to the vest as possible, or they have no comprehensive plan whatsoever. What's transpired over the last four seasons, we'd put our money on the latter, sadly.

Passan gave it his best shot, but it was as conservative as it gets. And the Yankees can't afford to be anything close to conservative this offseason.

Yankees News: Jeff Passan weighs in on Ohtani, Yamamoto, Bellinger chances for NY

Passan doesn't think the Yankees are going to be involved on Ohtani, but he isn't going to rule it out. He thinks they'll be "in big" on Yamamoto, but the right-hander, Passan believes, will be the second-highest paid free agent this offseason, which definitely doesn't help the Yankees' chances. He "wonders" if Bellinger will be a target.

His guess seems to be as good as the average Yankees fan, which isn't convincing, and the fact he seemingly knows more about what the Mets might do (insinuating they're expected to be aggressive) also doesn't bode well for the Bombers.

Don't forget, Kodai Senga is doing his best to recruit Yamamoto to the Mets as well, and Steve Cohen probably likes the idea because of the output he's gotten from Senga in 2023. The rookie was one of the best pitchers in the National League after signing a five-year, $75 million contract. Yamamoto is far younger and has had a more impressive career in Japan.

Ohtani's market will be limited and pricey. Yamamoto's market will be vast and pricey. Bellinger's market? We don't really know, but it seems like a ~$200 million contract is something Scott Boras will shoot for, and that doesn't really fit the Yankees' needs.

All we can hope for is the Yankees' maintaining this mysterious approach to come out of left field and strike when teams are least expecting. But when's the last time they did that? Excuse us while we try to find a silver lining.