Yankees Cannot Afford to Let Masahiro Tanaka Walk After 2020 Season

The New York Yankees' rotation was very briefly a shining light during the enthusiasm spurt of the 2020 offseason.

Then, New Yorkers got hit with a dose of reality.

Gerrit Cole swiftly went from a luxury to a necessity when Luis Severino had Tommy John surgery and James Paxton hit the pine following a back procedure. Suddenly, New York was banking on Cole and their forever-stalwart Masahiro Tanaka to carry the load.

And after 2020, things get that much tougher to manage. Paxton, currently felled by injury, won't be under contract anymore. Neither will Tanaka.

2020 is the final year of Tanaka's initial deal in New York (time whizzes by so fast, doesn't it?), and the 31-year-old has gone from ace to injury unknown to essential during his remarkable tenure.

His regular season inconsistency has led him to be chronically under-appreciated, though one glance at Tanaka's postseason statistics prove just how value he's been. A 1.76 ERA across six series against the best baseball has to offer. Heck, he was the only Yankee to show up for the bell in the '18 ALCS against the Red Sox. The unflappable Tanaka, once thought lost to an elbow issue in 2014, has instead become the team's most reliable source of guile in the years that have followed.

And they simply cannot let him walk following whatever sort of 2020 campaign takes place.

Cole's the team's leader; there's no question about that. But Severino's lost year isn't the only partial season on his ledger, and he won't be back until mid-2021. Paxton has never hit free agency before, and will likely be angling for a major payday following '20. We all love Jordan Montgomery, Michael King, and Clarke Schmidt, but the fewer rotation spots they're assured, the better.

Tanaka is the New York Yankees' heartbeat, and the team would be making a grave mistake sacrificing that following 2020.