(
)
Robinson Cano should use Carmelo Anthony as a role model. It would help the Yankees and it would enhance his free-agent value next offseason — particularly to the Yankees.
Cano and Anthony have a good deal in common, at least coming into this NBA season. Both have had renown as offensive geniuses. Anthony could roll out of bed and score 30 in the middle of summer, Cano could roll out of bed and hit line drives in the dead of winter.
But also there have been questions about their motors, passions and abilities to make those around them better.
Here in his 10th season, as the prime-aged star on one of the oldest teams in NBA history, Anthony has embraced the concepts of leading by example with energy, hustle and commitment to a full game. He remains a scoring wizard, but the chants of “MVP, MVP” at MSG are about more than balls swishing through nets.
Here is Cano readying for his ninth season, as the prime-aged star on what likely is to be the majors’ oldest team. The Yankees sure need him to be a hitting wizard, considering the defections and deteriorations elsewhere in the lineup. But the Yankees need more than that.
There probably are no two managers I respect more than Tampa Bay’s Joe Maddon and Baltimore’s Buck Showalter. Both are not just baseball savants and master tacticians, but they also are terrific at understanding the human alchemy of the game. And what stands out when I have asked about the chances for a Yankees nosedive is that they talk about the day when Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera and Andy Pettitte are no longer around. Because Showalter and Maddon see the old guard as vital to maintaining a culture of professionalism, protocol and expectations that braces the clubhouse through crises and helps the team to 90-plus wins annually, as if by muscle memory.
Thus, the baton needs to be passed, preferably to a homegrown Yankee. The logical heir would be Cano. Except the heir cannot be someone whose public caricature is a player jogging to first base.
Now, an aside here with a point I have made before: No player that I covered jogged out more grounders than Paul O’Neill. But he slammed bats and helmets and water coolers, and got dubbed “The Warrior.” And this is not a trashing of O’Neill, who always was prepared to play and passionate about winning. This is about perception and reality.
For I think Cano cares a ton, too. He is a very hard worker, and you do not play in the third-most games in the majors over the past six years unless you love to play and have great fortitude, especially with all the wear and traffic with which a middle infielder copes.
But this is a question about how Cano wants to be perceived — by fans, by the Yankees brass, by the baseball industry in general. When the Yankees slump I cannot tell you how many emails and tweets I receive blaming Cano’s lack of hustle. I think it is like blaming a fire on a match. Nevertheless, the anger is real and not coming from an inconsequential amount of Yankees fans.
Obviously, the Yankees will base any bid to keep Cano long term mainly on his ability, their projections of his longevity and what their team/lineup would look like without him. But the extra points to get a deal to where Cano wants — likely above $200 million — would come if the organization saw him as someone who could lead the team into the future, someone who inspired fan passion with more than his skills. In other words, can Cano channel his inner Carmelo?
Look, I understand that Cano is going to play hardball in these negotiations. I reported from the GM Meetings in early November that his friends were saying he was on a discounted multi-year contract now with the Yankees, and he never would do a discount again to stay. He is a Scott Boras client and there is a well-established hard-line script to follow, and there would be no surprise if Cano became next offseason’s Albert Pujols or Josh Hamilton, and followed the dollars out of town.
But I think I have covered Cano long enough to know that he wants his cake and to eat it, too, here; that he loves being a Yankee, knows how the Stadium enhances his skills, recognizes what career-long association in pinstripes means post-playing days in dollars and legacy. His roots, charity, heart and comfort zone are here.
So it is in his best interest this winter to figure out not only how to keep hitting line drives, but also what it will take to make the leap that Anthony has made beyond just great offensive ability. Like with the Knicks, an older Yankees team needs its prime-age star to Melo out.
joel.sherman@nypost.com