It is the day after Juan Soto agreed to join the New York Mets in free agency rather than rejoin the Yankees, and as such you are likely to hear or read Yankees fans' reactions to this development, if you have not already. This is not necessarily because there are a lot of them, but rather because they are very loud and have a baseline assumption that you are interested in what they have to say. There is not much you can do about that. What you can do is prepare with this helpful guide to the various flavors of Yankees fan cope. Once you are educated, you will be able to look beyond the cockiness and bargaining and see the huffing, puffing, and weeping beneath.
(Full disclosure: I am a Yankees fan and I'm trying to convince myself of all of these, and it's not working.)
"Now we can afford to sign multiple guys." By best estimates, the Yankees annually take in in revenue about what Soto will earn over the entirety of his deal; they could always afford to sign Soto and also other guys. Still, losing out on their top target will likely mean the Yankees will spread their budget around some second-tier free agents, and try very hard to convince people that their team is more well-rounded than if they had signed Literally Ted Williams. Tanner Scott and Carlos Estevez? Start planning the parade.
"We only want guys who want to be here." I can think of one way the Yankees could have made Soto want to be there!
"$765 million is just too much money." I for one am just glad each assorted Steinbrenner heir now stands to inherit several extra hundred million dollars. And of course, if there's anything Yankees fans hate, it's when they spend a lot of money on a superstar player. They've stopped bellowing "count the ringzz!" and started hollering "observe the fiscal restraint!"
"Soto's going to miss hitting in front of Judge." Juan Soto is Juan Soto, so he will hit whether he's being protected by Aaron Judge or Bashar damn al-Assad. In reality, he'll likely slot in between Francisco Lindor and Mark Vientos, which sure ain't bad. There's an extra level of Yankees fan cope in here, which is to pretend the Mets don't likely already have the better lineup, and the more stocked farm system, and the better future prospects for improvement given their owner's willingness to spend. A fanbase that has spent its lifetime with a civic superiority complex is learning what it's like to be The Other Team in New York, and it doesn't like it very much.
"We're scrappy underdogs and that's how we like it." This person just laid a single rose in front of their basement George Steinbrenner shrine.
"The Mets will regret this contract by the end of it." Fangraphs projects Soto with a .390 OBP in the year 2039, which broadly tells an absurd story of how good and young he is at this moment, and how well his game is likely to age. But even if he eventually becomes a shell of himself, there's no amount of down years that could ever make a team regret employing a solid decade of MVP-level production. The going rate for Soto simply involves paying him into his 40s, because it includes having one of the best two or three hitters in baseball in his late 20s and early 30s. Real regrets involve starting Trent Grisham on opening day.
"The Yankees needed to focus on defense anyway." This is coming from someone who was hastily googling DRS and OAA at 10:30 p.m.
"This is bad for baseball." They'd beg to sign Bashar al-Assad if he could hit lefties.
"At least it wasn't the Red Sox." This one is legit.
