By james art 
For the disheartened Yankees fans, consider the depths of this time on the calendar last year.
Brian Cashman took the stand at the GM meetings in Scottsdale, Ariz., where he strongly defended the club’s operations after an 82-win season and said the Yankees’ processes and people are “very good.”
After 2024, which fell three wins short of a World Series title, the temperature will be turned down at this year’s meetings in San Antonio, but questions remain about a championship drought that has reached 15 years for a team entering another key off season.
For the first time since the club’s hopes ended in a wild Game 5 against the Dodgers on Wednesday, Cashman will speak publicly about a season that saw improvement, but not enough for a franchise that has made World Series championships — not appearances — its standard.
Baseball executives are expected to arrive in Texas on Monday before the games officially begin on Tuesday.
By the time meetings wrap up Thursday morning, there should be more clarity on how the Yankees plan to approach this offseason, with Cashman answering questions like:
Do the Yankees need an answer to Juan Soto relatively quickly?
Super agent Scott Boras won’t mind taking his time allowing each team to court their client and watching the bidding war unfold over the next few months.
The Yankees — and any other club willing to deal with Soto — aren’t sure if they’re shelling out hundreds of millions of dollars for one of the most attractive free agents in sports, or if that money should be spent elsewhere.
Does Cashman feel as if such a huge domino is bound to fall, one way or another, in relatively short order?
If Soto slips, the Yankees will have to turn around quickly.
What’s the deal with Gerrit Cole?
The ace opted out of the remaining four years and $144 million on his contract on Saturday.
The Yankees can keep Cole off the market by attaching an additional $36 million season that would ensure he remains at the top of their rotation through 2029.
There was confusion over the deadline for that decision, which was thought to be Sunday before it was set for Monday. It is unclear whether the two sides have agreed to move him back.
It is possible for the parties to negotiate.
There’s a strong case to be made that the Yankees can’t afford to risk losing the face of their rotation and among the best pitchers in baseball, even if he’s 34 and starting to show signs of that age.
There’s also a strong argument that the Yankees can’t afford to guarantee $180 million to a pitcher if their No. 1 priority is Soto and there are other top starters.
Can wages rise?
The Yankees’ payroll topped $300 million for the first time in 2024, surpassing the top luxury tax threshold — the “Steve Cohen tax” — of $297 million.
FanGraphs currently projects a projection of $245 million for tax purposes next year (which assumes Cole returns) — and that’s before a megacontract for Soto and any significant offseason moves.
If the Yankees sign Soto and keep Cole, will there be room for other additions?
Or is Hal Steinbrenner adamant about cutting wages from a level he didn’t want to reach?
In May, he called the 2024 payroll “unsustainable.”
“I was a broken record [on this topic]: I don’t believe I have to have a $300 million salary to win a championship,” Steinbrenner said at the time. “I believe I need a good mix of veterans who will make a lot more money, but we’ve also put a lot of money into our player development system over the last 5-10 years. And in my opinion, we have one of the best in baseball right now.”
Are personnel or training changes needed to create a more fundamentally sound team?
The Yankees were able to swallow fielding and baserunning errors during a regular season that ended with an AL East title and through two rounds of the postseason that ended with a pennant.
But a team that was rated as the worst bullpen in baseball, according to FanGraphs, and constantly hurt defensively, paid for its mistakes in the World Series — culminating in a three-run error in the fifth inning of Game 5 that would be remembered.
Are the deficiencies a personnel problem that can be solved by recruiting players?
Or are the deficiencies a structural problem where the coaching is not strong enough? Speaking of which:
Will Aaron Boone return?
The presumed answer is yes, but there’s nothing official about a manager who just completed the final guaranteed year of his contract with a club option for 2025.
“We’re certainly happy to have him as our manager,” Cashman said during the ALDS. “We have the best record in the American League [and] won the AL East. Now we’re going to try to win the postseason and try to go all the way to the top.”
For the first time under Boone, the Yankees reached the World Series.
But for the seventh straight time under Boone, they fell short of the mission. Will this matter?