8:01 PM ET Jeff PassanESPN Close ESPN MLB insiderAuthor of “The Arm: Inside the Billion-Dollar Mystery of the Most Valuable Commodity in Sports” The New York Yankees have made signing right-hander Gerrit Cole their clear offseason priority and have ownership-level approval to offer him a record-setting deal, sources familiar with their plans told ESPN. The

10:15 AM ET The day Gerrit Cole picks his next team will be a holiday for some team’s fan base, for some team’s front office. That team — maybe the Yankees, maybe the Angels or the Dodgers or the Giants — will have locked down a staff ace for most of the next decade, the

11:31 AM ET ESPN News Services STAMFORD, Conn. — While Brian Cashman was descending the outside of a building Friday, the New York Yankees general manager came across a message taped to a 10th-floor window from a fan: Please sign Gerrit Cole. Cashman, whose rappelling adventure has become a holiday tradition, confirmed he met with

10:46 AM ET Tampa Bay Rays left-hander and former Cy Young winner Blake Snell had an immediate and strong reaction when he apparently learned about his team’s reported trade of outfielder Tommy Pham to the San Diego Padres. “We gave Pham up for Renfroe and a damn slapd— prospect?” Snell said during a Twitch stream

12:41 AM ET Jeff PassanESPN Close ESPN MLB insiderAuthor of “The Arm: Inside the Billion-Dollar Mystery of the Most Valuable Commodity in Sports” The San Diego Padres, intent on winning in 2020, agreed to a trade for outfielder Tommy Pham and a prospect from the Tampa Bay Rays in exchange for outfielder Hunter Renfroe and

9:45 PM ET Tory BarronESPN Editor Close Tory Barron is a Bristol-based writer and editor for ESPN.com. After retiring from playing lacrosse at UConn, the DC native decided to try her hand at writing about people playing sports. You must unlearn what you have learned about elite Internet memes in the past because Baby Yoda

1:19 PM ET Associated Press NEW YORK — Two 31-year-old players from the South Korean League have been posted by their clubs and made available to major league teams. Negotiations may start Friday with left-hander Kwang-Hyun Kim of the SK Wyverns and outfielder Jae-Hwan Kim of the Doosan Bears, the commissioner said Thursday. A deal

5:37 PM ET Steve Cohen, a billionaire who owns a small percentage of the New York Mets, is negotiating an agreement to increase his investment, a move that could signal that Fred and Jeff Wilpon’s longtime control of the franchise will be over within five years. Sterling Partners, the company that runs the Mets, and

5:06 PM ET Associated Press NEW YORK — Cleveland Indians pitcher Carlos Carrasco and Atlanta Braves third baseman Josh Donaldson have won the Comeback Player of the Year awards. Major League Baseball made the announcement on Wednesday. Carrasco won the American League award. He was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia in early June, missed three

2:29 PM ET Right-hander Zack Wheeler and the Philadelphia Phillies are in agreement on a five-year, $118 million contract, sources tell ESPN’s Jeff Passan. Wheeler was considered the prize of the free agency class among starting pitchers for teams who didn’t want to compete in stratospheric bidding for Gerrit Cole and Stephen Strasburg. The Phillies,