Brian Cashman insists Trent Grisham’s return won’t rule out the Yankees from pursuing Cody Bellinger

Brian Cashman said it before Trent Grisham accepted the qualifying offer, and two days later he doubled it.

While the Yankees will have some limits on where they go to land a free agent — a la Yoshinobu Yamamoto or Juan Soto — having Grisham at a $22.025 million salary won’t get in the way of how fast they go in their pursuit to re-sign Cody Bellinger as well.

“Just like anything else, there are certain salary levels that we have to meet,” Cashman said Thursday evening at the Covenant House Sleep Out at the Javits Center, where he was participating for the 14th time to raise money and awareness about youth homelessness.

“That’s yet to be determined. But we’ve driven hard at times to get things done. We’ve driven hard and still haven’t gotten things done, because the markets – whether it was Yamamoto or Soto – just keep going and going and going into places you never expected. So you just don’t know how free will is going to work. That’s why it’s so important to me to do what I always do – what all GMs do – which is get your fellow GMs and the agents involved.”

For example, Cashman said he spoke with agent Casey Close on Thursday about top free agent outfielder Kyle Tucker, along with his other clients like first baseman Paul Goldschmidt and right-hander Michael King.

And he spoke with Scott Boras on Wednesday about Bellinger and Japanese right-hander Tatsuya Imai.

Grisham returning with a much higher average annual value (compared to his $5 million salary this year) brought the Yankees’ projected 2026 luxury tax payroll to $281 million, according to Cot’s Contracts, at a time when Hal Steinbrenner has said having a $300 million payroll is “unsustainable.”

But Cashman insisted he still has the financial flexibility to do what he needs to do this offseason.

“I’m not going to advise anyone to go fast, [but] Bellinger is the obvious one,” he said. “We can play a little bit and not be crazy if we don’t say so. But other than that, I’m not going to say who we will lean on more or not. But we certainly need to engage all these players in the market and try to figure out what the acquisition costs are and see how this would fit for us.”

As for Grisham accepting the qualifying offer Tuesday — which came as somewhat of a surprise externally — Cashman said he was “50-50” on whether it would happen.

He considered Grisham the “third best outfielder” in a tight outfield market, but acknowledged that the center fielder probably should have waited for Tucker and Bellinger to sign first, which involved some “gambling.”

“We’re glad he accepted it because it’s an important piece that’s been dealt with,” Cashman said. “He gives us some comfort and security, and we did that [Aaron] Judge, we have Grisham, and I have the combination of a match between [Jasson] Domínguez and Spencer Jones, at the very least. But I also have the marketplace that has Bellinger on it, Tucker on it, and others on it, also trades to think about. So we’ll see where it all takes us.”

It’s also a safe bet that the Yankees bring back Grisham with a high AAV, as his breakout season came in 2025 after three straight below-average offensive seasons.

But Cashman said the Yankees believe what the 29-year-old did this year — 34 home runs with an .811 OPS — is sustainable.

“All the underlying information that leads you to believe – real or not real – points to the real arrow,” Cashman said. “All the supporting information supports that the changes he’s made are real and they should continue. … And the fact that he did it here. It would be a little bit riskier if that happened somewhere else and we imported him because then you don’t have the New York factor and can they do it under pressure here?”

“He did it all [here]and he did it at home and on the road too, so it wasn’t the Yankee Stadium effect or whatever. He answered many questions. It came unexpectedly, [but] grateful that it happened.”