Sabathia: 'I'd be panicking' if I was still a free agent

CC Sabathia seems pretty happy to have a home in 2018.

The veteran left-hander returned to the New York Yankees on a one-year, $10-million contract in December, and it's looking more and more like he's one of the luckier free agents. Many prominent names, including former Cy Young winner Jake Arrieta, remain without contracts although camps have already opened.

Asked how he'd feel to be in Arrieta's position Thursday, Sabathia didn't mince words.

"I'd be panicking," he said, according to Mike Mazzeo of the New York Daily News. "I don't know him (Arrieta) at all, but just to see guys in spring training getting ready and things like that and you have a family and you're trying to figure stuff out factors into how you pitch and play."

He added, "Everything was kind of moving slow for me, too. I've never seen what we've been going through this year. ... I was just happy I was able to get (my deal) done."

The 37-year-old Sabathia, a veteran of the free-agent process, knows of what he speaks. In the winter of 2008, Sabathia turned his early-career success into a $161-million contract from the Yankees before his age-28 season. Three years later, he opted out of that contract and re-upped in New York on a five-year, $122-million deal.

Sabathia isn't sure what can be done to help restart the market immediately, but suggested a possible tweak to the system that might help future free-agent classes avoid the problems of this offseason.

"Maybe we shorten the years that you go to free agency," he said. "Make it four years instead of six, so guys that have a chance to be in their 20s going into free agency instead of 30."