Cashman finds a night on the streets hard

Brian Cashman could deal with the light wind in the early- morning hours that dropped the chill factor almost to 30 degrees.

The concrete was a different matter.

"I don't care how much you move and how much stuff you bring, it's still concrete," Cashman said shortly after 6 a.m. Friday after spending the night outside in a lot adjacent to the Covenant House shelter near the Port Authority Bus Terminal. "There was no comfort to be found."

The phrase "spending the night" is specifically chosen. The Yankees' general manager didn't recall actually sleeping.

"If you're doing the over/under on an hour, I'd definitely take the under," Cashman said.

Cashman is on the board of directors for Covenant House, which assists homeless youth, and was among 48 leaders from the business and entertainment industry who participated in the charity's CEO Solidarity Sleepout.

Wearing several layers of clothing and a wool pullover hat, Cashman ensconced himself in a sleeping bag, with two collapsed cardboard boxes separating him from the ground, just after midnight and went to "bed."

Participants did not use pillows, but Cashman said even if he had had one, his comfort wouldn't have improved drastically.

"I don't think you can turn concrete into anything other than concrete," he said. "It is what it is. It's something you have to get used to, and ultimately that's what this is about: having people not in a position to have to try and get used to something like that."

His hope was to raise money and awareness for the services provided daily by Covenant House, which is run by Kevin Ryan, a close friend who lived on Cashman's dorm floor at Catholic University.

"If this was an everyday event, I don't know how I would be able to function," Cashman said. "You'd just eventually have a systems shutdown."

He said later of his night: "Shining a light on what Covenant House does is worth it." Donations still can be made at ceosleep.org.

Friday morning concluded a 24-hour flurry of activity in which Cashman woke up early Thursday morning in Milwaukee for the end of the owners' and general managers' meetings, attended a charity dinner that night on Staten Island, then headed to midtown for the sleepout.

According to Cashman, not much came of the meetings.

"I showed up, I had some conversations that went nowhere," he said. "I exorcised some demons, I call them, which are ideas. I floated some weather balloons that popped. Mostly trade stuff. Free-agent stuff, these guys haven't made any offers. I have made offers and received offers on trade stuff, but it's gone nowhere. The free-agent stuff is moving at a glacial speed."

Cashman met with, among others, the agents for pitchers C.J. Wilson, Bartolo Colon, Joel Piñeiro, Roy Oswalt and Cuban outfielder Yoennis Cespedes, whom the Yankees have scouted, and continue to scout, extensively in the Dominican Republic.

Cespedes has not yet been declared a free agent -- MLB continues to wait for his paperwork to go through -- and another potential target, Japanese righthander Yu Darvish, has not been posted.

"Players that I have specific interest in, I don't believe are jumping off the board here, at least up through this week," Cashman said generally of the free-agent class. "But trade stuff, that's different. That can move fast if somebody finds the right match."

A bit was made at the meetings of Wilson's representatives asking about a visit to New York, but Cashman said nothing official had been planned. As of now, it seems as though Wilson, whose initial asking price is likely to be prohibitive for Cashman, appears more enthused about a visit than the Yankees are.

"They said, 'Would you be opposed to C.J. coming to New York,' and I said no," Cashman said. "But I didn't follow up on it."

Extra basesThe Yankees added five players to their 40-man roster -- righthanders David Phelps and D.J. Mitchell, infielders David Adams and Corban Joseph and outfielder Zoilo Almonte -- which protects them from next month's Rule 5 draft. Their roster stands at 39.