Now off the hook for A-Rod's 2014 salary, what do the Yanks do next?

Now that Alex Rodriguez has been officially banned for the entire 2014 season, the new question is, "what will the Yankees do next?"

With A-Rod's contract off the books for this season, the Yankees now have an extra $24 million to spend this offseason. The Yankees salary cap right now is currently at $151 million, but teams are generally charged about $16 million throughout the season for insurance and minor league call-ups.

With holes in their rotation, bullpen and infield, the Yankees face some tough decisions in the near future.

The Yankees have two options; one is to continue to go all out with spending just as they have done this whole offseason, or they can find ways to be creative in building their team and filling spots. Having just signed Scott Sizemore to compete to fill their third base hole, the Yankees will now dedicate a lot of their time to look for pitching.

Hal Steinbrenner appears to still be pushing for Masahiro Tanaka to sign with New York. If the Yankees were to sign Tanaka, there is no way they could stay under the luxury tax. If this happened, due to already being over the tax, the Yankees would most likely keep pushing to bring in big named free agents.

It has been rumored that if the Yankees sign Tanaka, they will also go after Ubaldo Jimenez. These two guys would be Steinbrenner's solution to the rotation gap, but it would not fix the luxury tax issue.

If the Yankees decide to take the spending route, they also need bullpen help. Some names that have come up in discussion to fill the holes in the Yankees bullpen are Grant Balfour, Francisco Rodriguez and Oliver Perez among others. The addition of these veteran relievers would strengthen the Yankees bullpen and provide them with depth.

However, if Tanaka were to sign elsewhere, the Yankees front office would have a tough decision to make. to keep spending, or try to do what they did a few years back when they had a six man rotation with Freddy Garcia and Bartolo Colon on the back end of the rotation.

Some players that can fill this role are Bruce Chen and Erik Bedard. These players are cheap options that can sign for less than $1 million and be very effective throughout the 2014 season.

They Yankees have always wanted to "win now" and by going the spending route, they can accomplish just that.

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