January 15th, 2026: The Yankees officially announced Blackburn’s signing today.
December 21st, 2025: The Yankees are expected to re-sign right-hander Paul Blackburn, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post. It’s a one-year deal worth $2MM. The Boras Corporation client can earn an additional $500K through incentives: $100K for 80, 90, 100, 110 and 120 innings pitched.
Blackburn landed with the Yankees after getting released by the Mets in August. He made eight appearances with the club, recording a 5.28 ERA with more than a strikeout per inning. Blackburn had been a starter for the majority of his career, but worked strictly as a reliever with the Yankees. The now 32-year-old had a miserable debut with the team, allowing seven earned runs in 3 1/3 innings to begin his time in the Bronx. He bounced back from there, holding opponents to just two earned runs over his next 12 innings.
Blackburn spent the first seven years of his big-league career with the Athletics. He offered modest results as a back-of-the-rotation depth piece, with stretches of above-average performance. The Mets picked up Blackburn in a minor trade at the 2024 deadline. He struggled through five starts with the team to close that season. Blackburn dealt with spine and knee injuries heading into the 2025 campaign. He didn’t appear in a game until June, and then missed another six weeks with a shoulder issue. Blackburn tossed five scoreless innings in his first outing of the season. He then gave up at least three runs in each of the next five appearances.
While Blackburn was solely a reliever for the Yankees, the contract incentives suggest there might be room for a rotation spot. He gets $100K if he reaches 80 innings, and an additional $100K for each 10-inning milestone he hits up through 120 innings. New York has a relatively soft rotation behind Max Fried and Cam Schlittler. Luis Gil, Will Warren, and Ryan Yarbrough will likely fill out the rest of the staff. Carlos Rodon, Gerrit Cole, and Clarke Schmidt are currently on the mend.
I think this subs for Imai…….NOT
Off-season is now officially done.
Ha!!
Wow, first Rosario and now this. The Yankees love former Mets. I wonder if they’ll bring back Carrasco too. /s
Paging Daniel Vogelbach. . .
No former Mutts, and no milkshake either
yet the last two signings are former mets?
Yeah you want em’ back?
Is he the guy they’ll bring in if they’re winning by too much or something?
The highest leverage pitchers for the Yankees ’24-’25 were Clay Holmes, Luke Weaver and Devin Williams; now all with the Mets. Then there’s Juan Soto. Long time Yankee from a teenager signing, Luis Severino suited up the blue & orange. Further down, the Mets followed the Yankees in trying their luck with Harrison Bader and Frankie Montas.
(Blackburn pitched for the Yanks last year as well.)
Well, well, well, would you look at that. The Yankees just signed Zack Short as well. Also had Stroman last year too.
Blackburn signing in the dead of night
Lol, good one!
That’s excellent.
Very creative.
Blackburn signing in the dead of night
Cashman has no funds with which to buy
All his life, Hal was only waiting for a salary cap to arrive…
has no funds compared to Uncle Stevie, yeah
You were only waiting for this moment to arise.
You got me..lol
I’m sorry…you really got me.
Blackburn signing in the dead of night
Take this retread arm as the fans cry
No Imai
Hal was surely wasting the era of All Rise
Blackburn slinging it in the dead of night
I ain’t no broken down pitcher
My fastball’s all-right
Damn batter only waiting for my sinker to arise
The famous pirate Blackbeard uses a mirror and he finds ten moles on his back.
Being a health-conscious pirate, he books an appointment with his local dermatologist to get them checked out. The dermatologist takes a look and says “Well, Mr. Pirate, I have done a thorough examination and I am pretty sure they’re benign”
Blackbeard replies “Arrrrrr, can ye check again? I’m sure there be ten!”
You charge per appearance or hourly?
Ooof.
All i read was “Paul Skenes traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Bobby Miller and Gavin Stone”
Perfectly reasonable trade for all sides.
A third team has entered, the Yankees are getting rushing pages and Roki for Clint Frazier
You’re screen might be broken…
Couldn’t get King, so pivoted to Blackburn. Solid.
King #2 SP, Blackburn #6ish. They got paid to reflect as much. Blackburn is fine if he is your swing guy, maybe competing for a 5th spot in the rotation. I could be sold that he is a small tweak from being a #4 guy. There is talent there.
I think “yuck” is the only fair reaction.
I have nothing against this signing, he actually looked like he knew what he was doing when I saw him pitch in relief. No, what scares me is what it might imply. Hal is in a penny pinching mode by all accounts. Is this how the bullpen issues are going to be addressed? If so, Yankees fans need to run to their dentist and have a tooth guard built because I almost hear teeth grinding already… Putting a positive spin on the news Cashman might be on the verge of a major move, one which will tie up a lot of money. Although Bellinger would seem to be the obvious choice my bet would be to buy Imai (assuming of course that the front office has a consensus that Imai is the real deal), put the younger, cheaper Martian in left field, find a right-handed glove to be his caddy. With Imai the team won’t feel pressured to rush any of their rehabbing pitchers back, and they should have some quality spare starters to trade for offensive reinforcements as the season progresses. Unfortunately, the roster construction isn’t ideal, the outfield is thin, and so is the left side of the infield. This free agent market is just about the worst case scenario for the Yankees to optimize what they have. But “there’s no crying in baseball”.
Honestly I see this like the Weaver signing a couple year backs after we just got a sample size of him. Failed starter turned reliever still finding his footing, but may have something there. Look at Brad Keller for an example as well.
I’m not thinking of this any other way, but good deal.
Salzilla:
Major difference between guys like Weaver and Keller versus Blackburn is that Blackburn really just doesn’t have very good stuff. Doesn’t throw very hard. Needs to be perfect. Not a guy who I really see his stuff playing much better in the bullpen than starting.
He had a decent run to end the season and you don’t necessarily need the same stuff to be a good reliever. Weaver was terrible before even with better stuff. Blackburn has been a good starter before, so it’s a bit different but for that price? It’s not a bad deal.
Salzilla:
Just don’t see where his middling stuff does anything to help a bullpen. He really hasn’t had any recent success. I really didn’t see him have many good stretches last year. I just didn’t see the reason for offering him more than a minor league deal.
Well the Yankees do so we’ll have to leave it to the professionals to figure it out.
Salzilla:
Yeah, but we know the professionals aren’t always right. And isn’t the point of this forum for us to be debating these things or else why are we even here? lol
Theres no point in talking to Sal. If he doesnt agree with him he will just pivot to something silly like that until he feels like he won the convo
Debating isn’t a prerequisite of this forum. It’s Paul Blackburn and 2 million bucks, it doesn’t mean a heck of a whole lot and definitely not worthy of a long debate.
see what i mean lmao
Salzilla:
And yet here you are, doing it anyway. Yeah we’re actually here to talk about the moves that are being made. And I think this was a stupid one. It’s a minor move, but minor moves can be stupid too. He will waste a roster spot and he’ll be a waste of $2 million. When he has a 6 ERA in July, just remember this conversation.
Begamin:
Yes, I see that. You are correct. But I’m still going call people out on nonsense.
Good points, but the professionals are right way more often than we are.
Yankee Doubter:
Maybe not the ones that get fired…
Well, when we get hired we’ll find out how tough it really is.😉
Yankee Doubter:
We won’t, but some other dope will. Don’t be so in awe of the people who get hired for these positions. They’re pretty much regular people put in power. If you don’t believe me, look at the history of executives in baseball.
Miken, I gotta jump back here, we’re all regular people, but some have expertise that others don’t either from talent or schooling or experience. So to say what you’re saying is just silly. You would not be hired for a GM position (or other baseball job) without the training or experience. You are not equal to any of these guys in these jobs. I do not analyze any of this stuff as much as they do, so when we stop and say well I’ll defer to the professionals that’s out of respect for what they’ve been trained to do. It’s not awe, it’s respect. You do not know better than they do, none of us do, full stop.
Salzilla:
That was never the point I was making. The point I was making though is that general manager isn’t a skill that you go to school for or that you necessarily get some advanced expertise in. They gain knowledge in evaluation and how to run a front office and use data but it’s a very inexact science. I think we probably give a little too much credit to some of the people who are making these decisions. We’ve seen decision makers throughout sports be absolute disasters. Obviously they all have qualifications beyond us, and I would never say that any of us are going to be in that job so don’t be glib and try and act like that’s what I was saying, but let’s not give them too much credit either. The list of failed executives is longer than I can go through.
Um a lot of these guys do go to school for it. There’s literally sports management degrees and there’s a lot of applicable adjacent degrees or like equivalent parts experience from playing.
So to me and seemingly others it does sound like you are putting these guys down. Saying that there’s failure in jobs is whatever, because that’s across every job. You can criticize as much as you want, but after a while it gets tiresome so we default to leave it to the professionals because we aren’t getting anywhere here.
Salzilla:
I’m just saying no school or education is ever going to really prepare you for the full extent of the duties of a general manager and the art of negotiation and all the evaluation and nuances of that position. I’m not sure why this is such a personal thing for you, but are plenty of executives who have been complete failures. There are others who have been wonderful at it. I’m just saying not every professional is great. This is true in every walk of life. doctors go to school but is every doctor great? lawyers go to school but is every lawyer great? no sometimes they’re downright bad. That’s true of sports executives as well. I’m not sure how I can make this point any clearer
I’m not in “awe” of these people. But you need to understand that their job is more than running an upscale fantasy league. The GM has a lot of other duties besides making trades and shooting the crap. He has financial decisions to make concerning the running of the club and its affiliates. As far as evaluating talent the GM is listening to his scouts and coordinators, while over time, hopefully developing an eye for it. Not easy. And because a lot of those fail over time, what does it prove exactly? That they are fallible human beings? That they join the ranks of your lousy doctors and lawyers? Welcome to the real world!
@Yankee Doubter
Well written, good options & observations.
If the reported asking price for Bellinger is anywhere near true (multiple hundreds of millions) then you leave him in the net until the agent/player comes to his senses (not likely on the former) I am cautiously optimistic that Cashman has altered his methodology just enough that he might actually be interested in paying for what players are going to do forward, rather than what they’ve already done. Maybe the long and drawn out Stanton experience has had something to do with that?
@Poison
He didn’t offer a contract to Stanton. Randy Levine negotiated they contract directly with Cashman. Cashman preferred saving they money and going after Harper instead because he was younger, a lefty and a LF. Yanks at least got the Marlins to pay down the mat fee years of Stanton’s contract by $10 mil per.
No postseason for the Yanks in 2026.
That might be good for them. Not sure what it would take to shake Hal out of his cheap coccoon.
Good lord Yankees fans are insufferable
and yet here you are, and not making any sense, either
Third highest payroll in MLB is a lot of things, but “cheap” is not one of them. Also applies to the Red Sox, who spent what might very well be $500M extending players just last summer, but are also being labeled as cheap.
Yeah but they are too addicted to the one year deals and you don’t get the highest quality that way. When you give Trent Grisham 22 million and that’s your “big splash” something is very wrong.
Repeat after me “you cannot and should not have $35M players at every position”
Judge was 4th, Cole is 8th and Stanton is 13th, Rodon was 22, and Bellinger 24th in all of MLB salaries last year.
And for all the crap people give the Dodgers, they only had Ohtani and Glasnow in the Top 25.
(per spotrac) spotrac.com/mlb/rankings/player/_/year/2025/sort/c…
Good plus no baseball in 2027 so perhaps Hal will panic when is see significant revenue drop in 2026, no revenue in 2027 and watch how fast he opens his wallet in 2028.
This could be asteal, I really like this guy,he was an allstar just a couple years ago.
I don’t like this signing at all. Time will tell. I’d rather have given LaGrange and ERC a chance in the BP to gain experience. I’d even consider bringing back Cousins on the cheap
Cousins had Tommy John surgery in June and will be unabailable pretty much all season. I like him, too, and wouldn’t mind seeing him back on a two-year minor league deal to rehab and see how things go, but it would be with an eye toward 2027. His 2026 is shot.
This Blackburn thing is fine. It’s basically the Weaver deal from a couple years ago. It’s only a million or so above league minimum and, if he’s not performing, they can just cut him..
Blackburn “a steal?” He’s is and has always been awful.
Scott Boras only got him 2M? He couldn’t let them believe the Dodgers, Sox, and Jays were all interested?
Cashman?
More like trashman.
If I were guessing, cheap moves filling out the roster as a prelude to resigning Bellinger, or bringing in Bichette.
I’m thinking the same
Theyre doing neither lol Bellinger is more likely than Bichette but im not even sure ive heard any sort of Yankees Bichette rumor. Hal has asked for a salary cap more than hes talked about how many more players he wants to sign
Begamin- you really think the Yankees aren’t bringing in another free agent bat?
Don’t bet any of your friends on that one!
Only dumpster finds this year.
Decent pick up, could make 4 or 5 starts in April and slide into the bullpen if hurt pitchers return, if he is in the rotation come June plan on not making the playoffs
Stop the presses!!!! Sadly the youngsters probably have no idea what that means. 🙂
sadly, fans of other teams feel the need to comment on yankee moves for no reason
Good depth signing, he was pretty successful not too long ago, the further the injuries are behind him the better
Matt Blake is probably looking to work his magic and get Blackburn to be a decent bullpen for Boone.
What is with the Yankees signing all these former Mets…or something
Geez, im hoping guys like chafin remained unsigned again yankees will love to pick up a guy for 2.5 mill to add as a core shut down reliever.. to me this is a waste of 2 mill… yes he is a vet but the front office can’t possibly sell this to a fan base. What does Blackburn bring that a Lagrange or Erod or Cunningham can’t give to a bullpen? Id rather see a prospect get experience during garbage time add the 2 million to bellinger, get him resigned…
Good move. Long relief option, spot start option, experienced arm. Very low cost. Too much whining around here.
Solid signing by the Yankees.
Not.
Took a really long time to make it official.
The lights had gone out. The Yankees hadn’t paid the bill.
Nice! Yankees makin’ moves and getting top free agents!
Hope they held a huge press conference for this.
Cashman bringing in the best!
Yankees signing a few Boras clients…. where’s the break on bellinger
Oh yeah, he’ll save us
Yay!!!
Bellinger to sign with Dodgers next along with Eugenio Suarez.
Nothing personal but who cares! Just get Bellinger!!
The yankees need a total rebuild
Aren’t the Yankees embarrassed? What a PR disaster. (Isn’t their attitude the same as Boston/Bregman? Although Boston, had a good off season).