AL East: Yankees continue to be the most aggressive team in free agency

The last ace-caliber free agent pitcher is officially off the board as the New York Yankees are signing southpaw Carlos Rodón to a six-year, $162M contract. Jon Heyman of the New York Post was first to announce it with Bob Nightengale of USA Today following up with the financial breakdown.

The Rodón signing continues an absolutely massive offseason for the Yankees, who have now re-signed Anthony Rizzo, signed Tommy Kahnle to a two-year deal, re-signed Aaron Judge to a nine-year deal, and added Rodón.

While the Yankees continue to build their Evil Empire, there was reason to believe before the Rodón signing that they hadn't actually become a better team. The re-signing of Rizzo and Judge did little more than put the same product out on the field that they had last year. If this exact version of the Yankees couldn't win it all last year, what was the reasoning behind thinking they could in the upcoming year?

Now that Rodón is in tow, a clear step in the right direction has been made in the Yankees camp. You know your starting rotation is strong when Frankie Montas is projected to be the No. 5 starter and Domingo Germán is squeezed out and placed into a long relief role, which is exactly what FanGraphs' Roster Resource is predicting moving forward.

Outside of the Yanks, no other AL East club has made any moves of significance except for our very own Blue Jays. Toronto has made a big trade to acquire a shutdown reliever, signed one of the best defensive outfielders of this generation in Kevin Kiermaier and shored up the rotation with a Chris Bassitt addition.

The Red Sox? Crickets. At least, for the most part. The Sox have been "in on" every big free agent shortstop as well as some of the high-end arms that have all gone on to sign elsewhere. As things currently stand, the club has added lottery ticket Masataka Yoshida on offense and three bullpen arms in Kenley Jansen, Joely Rodríguez and Chris Martin.

Then there's the Orioles, who stunned the world in 2022 by somehow finishing above-.500 for the first time in years. They entered the offseason promising to be contenders for all of the biggest names in free agency including Carlos Correa and Justin Verlander. Instead, the team has added each of Franchy Cordero, Adam Frazier and Kyle Gibson on cheap one-year contracts.

And finally, the Rays have been the quietest AL East team this offseason. Forever the conservative spenders of the division, the club has made just one addition and it was a three-year deal with starting pitcher Zach Eflin that will likely blow up in their faces before the contract is up.

Hopefully this puts the Jays' offseason so far into perspective a bit more. While the club didn't land Correa, Verlander or Brandon Nimmo in free agency, Kevin Kiermaier and Chris Bassitt represent two of the bigger additions made by AL East clubs this offseason.

In the case of the Rays, Red Sox and Orioles, their clubs are already talented but each of them could have used some of the bigger players available on the open market to bolster the roster even further.

But for the Blue Jays, the club truly possesses either the No. 1 or No. 2 best roster in the division alongside the Yankees. Really, the Jays have done exactly what they set out to do this offseason and that's address center field and address the hole in the rotation.