Yankees Star Makes 2025 Plans Clear Even As He is Likely to Be Cut

Getty Yankees 1B Anthony Rizzo

It was not a great World Series showing for Yankees first baseman Anthony Rizzo, and considering his tenuous status with the team after this year, that was pretty poor timing.

Rizzo batted just .228 this season, with an on-base percentage of .301. He had an OPS of just .637, which ranks as the worst of his career. He suffered two significant injuries—freak plays in which he broke bones—and only played 92 games but still, Rizzo’s eight home runs represent the worst homer rate of his career.

Against the Dodgers, Rizzo batted 2-for-16 and had seven strikeouts and no extra-base hits.

The Yankees have the option of bringing him back as part of a three-year, $51 million contract he signed two years ago, but they also have the option of giving him a $6 million buyout and moving on at first base. With Rizzo at 35 years old, the consensus is that a buyout is coming and the team will soon need a new first baseman.

Yankees, Anthony Rizzo Have Much to Figure Out

Still, after the game on Wednesday, Rizzo indicated that he had every intention of staying with the Yankees—though the decision is not up to him. It’s up to GM Brian Cashman and the team’s front office.

“I am going to talk with Cash and the Yankees and see what they are thinking,” Rizzo said after the Yankees’ Game 5 loss to the Dodgers, via the New York Post.

He added that ideally, he would not be going anywhere: “I feel like I have a lot to offer to this game in a lot of different ways. I don’t want to take this [uniform] off.”

There is a chance that the Yankees could cut Rizzo, but bring him back on a cheaper deal. More likely, he will be elsewhere next season. He certainly regretted the way the season crashed out, especially in a disastrous fifth inning in Game 5, which saw Rizzo misplay a ball off the bat of Mookie Betts, a play on which starter Gerrit Cole did not cover first base.

Betts was safe, and instead of being the last out of the inning, the Dodgers rallied for five runs.

“That’s the last time you will ever be with that exact team, these exact people in that moment,” Rizzo said. “The uncertainty of what this clubhouse looks like next year is definitely up in the air. But when you lose like this, it’s more just giving each other hugs and letting each other know how much they mean to you.”