Yankees' Hal Steinbrenner: 'It's difficult' for owners to compete with Dodgers spending

Jan. 29 (UPI) -- New York Yankees owner Hal Steinbrenner admitted that "it's difficult" for MLB team owners to compete with the Los Angeles Dodgers' spending, but also believes his team is better than it was at this time last year.

Steinbrenner made the comments during an interview with the YES Network. The Dodgers enter spring training with a projected payroll of about $379 million, according to FanGraphs. They have committed nearly $500 million in guaranteed money to players this off-season. The Yankees' payroll is about $284 million, trailing only the Dodgers, New York Mets ($297M) and Philadelphia Phillies ($288M).

"It's difficult for most of us owners to be able to do the kinds of things that they're doing," Steinbrenner said of the Dodgers. "We'll see if it pays off.

"They still have to have a season relatively injury-free for it to work out for them. It's a long season as you know, and once you get to the postseason anything can happen. We've seen that time and time again."

One year after signing Shohei Ohtani for $700 million, Yoshinobu Yamamoto for $325 million, Tyler Glasnow for $136.6 million and Will Smith for $140 million, the Dodgers' 2025 off-season has included another surge of high-priced signings. They signed pitchers Blake Snell and Tanner Scott to respective $182 million and $72 million pacts. They also gave a $6.5 million deal to prized Japanese pitcher Roki Sasaki and recently agreed to another pact with free agent closer Kirby Yates.

They also signed Teoscar Hernandez for $66 million and brought in fellow outfielder Michael Conforto and infielder Hyeseong Kim.

Meanwhile, the Yankees, traditionally known for their own spending sprees, watched star outfielder Juan Soto and pitcher Clay Holmes leave to sign respective $765 million and $38 million pacts with the Mets.

They went on to improve their team by using some of the funds initially intended for Soto and other former stars, bringing in veteran first baseman Paul Goldschmidt and pitcher Max Fried in free agency and trading for outfielder Cody Bellinger and relief pitcher Devin Williams.

Steinbrenner's Yankees led the American League with 94 wins last season, but went on to lose to the Dodgers in five games in the World Series. A lack of production for their stars, paired with errors and other issues, led to their postseason collapse.

"The Dodgers were not better than us, they played better than us," Steinbrenner said.

The Yankees led MLB with 237 home runs in 2024. Their pitching staff posted a 3.74 ERA, which tied for the sixth-best in baseball. Yankees pitchers and catchers will report to spring training Feb. 11 in Tampa, Fla.