After Alex Rodriguez drew to within one home run of Willie Mays’s total of 660 on Sunday night, there was no sudden change in the Yankees’ approach to the contentious matter. They still do not intend to pay Rodriguez a bonus that he believes he is owed for matching Mays.
For Rodriguez, the matter is worth $6 million. For the Yankees, it is actually $9 million, according to multiple baseball officials. The reason is that the team would be taxed 50 percent on any added payment to Rodriguez because the Yankees are over the luxury-tax threshold and the figure would be added to the team’s payroll for 2015.