I try to keep my sports takes to social media posts and frantic texts to friends and family, but the Juan Soto news feels just too big to ignore.

As a Yankee fan, the news that he has left for greener pastures in Queens was obviously disappointing, but not surprising. When you cut through all the leaks and tea leaf reading, things went down largely as expected. It was reported throughout the season that he would go to the highest bidder and Mets owner Steve Cohen would not be outbid.

There was some talk that spending a year in pinstripes would endear him to the Yankees and he’d want to stay if the money was close enough. Aaron Judge, for instance, left money on the table to remain a Yankee. But clearly, Soto’s time in the Bronx didn’t change the main dynamic, which is that he wanted the most money. 

Some Yankee fans are focusing too much on the headline number — the $765 million he agreed to from the Mets vs. the reported $760 million he turned down from the Yankees — to argue that had Hal Steinbrenner just coughed up a measly few million more, they could have had him. But this analysis doesn’t take into account various other aspects of the offer.

The Yankees’ offer was for 16 years instead of 15, the Mets’ signing bonus was $75 million instead of $60 million, and with the Mets, Soto has a chance to opt out in five years and earn an extra $40 million over the rest of the contract. Also, this analysis assumes the offer Soto signed was Cohen’s best and final offer, even though as far as we know, he would have bid $50 million or $100 million more if that’s what it took.

There are also other Yankee fans who are ranting in anger against Soto, which is also ridiculous. Soto was not somebody who came up through the organization or owed the Yankees anything. He came here for one year. He is a businessman who performed the job he was paid to do while with the Yankees at an elite level without any drama, and he chose the better deal with another team. I will be rooting against the Mets and wouldn’t shed a tear if this free-agent signing doesn’t pan out, but I wouldn’t boo Soto were I to attend a Subway Series game. 

While there is no way to sugarcoat the loss of Soto as a Yankee fan, there is a way for the organization to treat missing out on him as an opportunity to approach team building from a more holistic perspective. Anybody who watched the Yankees regularly last year knows that they had glaring weaknesses that were ultimately exposed in the World Series — terrible base running, awful defense, unreliable starting pitching behind Gerrit Cole, and lack of depth once teams hit the middle of the batting order. I am not in the “blessing in disguise” camp on Soto, but I do think there was a risk that if the Yankees re-signed Soto, they’d view the offseason as a success and mainly run it back with the same team that lost 4–1 to the Dodgers. Losing him opens up a lot of opportunities to address other areas of need.

In terms of hitting ability, Soto is irreplaceable. But he also doesn’t have much speed and is an average-at-best defender (while Judge’s rare drop in game five was devastating and obviously got all the attention, Soto’s misplayed balls in right field cost the Yankees throughout the season and the World Series, especially game one). Rather than focus on trying to replace Soto’s offensive production, the Yankees should try to improve all other facets of the team that Soto cannot help with — namely, defense and pitching. On offense, the goal should be to try to make upgrades so there are solid, scrappy hitters deeper in the lineup, rather than the sink-or-swim situation this year, which allowed pitchers to breathe sighs of relief once they got past Judge and Soto. 

Obviously, this is easier said than done. One of the many attractions of Soto was that he was as close to a sure-fire free agent as you can get (just 26, no injury history, and a consistently elite performer rather than somebody who has volatile good and bad seasons). In that sense, it would have been easier to just sign Soto than trying to hit with multiple free-agent signings and trades, each carrying risk. But clearly the only way for the Yankees to pivot from Soto is to focus on all aspects of the game rather than trying to replace one of the best hitters of his generation.

UPDATE: And shortly after writing this, the Yankees took a step toward this approach by reaching agreement with ace Max Fried, who should make for a scary one-two punch when paired with Cole.