Neither Jeter nor his agent, Casey Close, has disclosed what numbers they are seeking, but it is believed Jeter wants a five- to six-year deal somewhere in the range of $20 million a year. If you do the math, that’s a difference of at least $50 million from the Yanks’ offer.

Most baseball analysts agree that, on the open market, the 36-year-old Jeter would attract no more than a two-year deal for a total of $15 million to $20 million.

– Anthony McCarron and Bill Madden, N.Y. Daily News.

OK, it’s important — as always — to take the contract details with several grains of salt, since neither Jeter nor his agent is on record with his contract demands. And I know that essentially every single human in the N.Y. sports media has provided his or her opinion on the negotiations, so there’s probably nothing new here.

But it strikes me that Jeter stands to lose a lot more than the Yankees if the two part ways. For one thing, there’s the straight-up cash part of it: No other Major League team would offer Jeter even the three-year, $50 million offer that’s rumored to be the Yankees’ starting bid.

Second, if Jeter cares at all about loyalty and legacy and all that jazz — and presumably he does, since those are like the most Derek Jeter-y things about Jeter at this point — then it behooves him to stay in the Bronx. He must know as well as anyone how offputting it would be to his fans to see him playing in another team’s uniform.

The Yankees stand to take a pretty sizy marketing hit if they let Jeter walk, but it seems unlikely that their fans will stop showing up en masse and watching games on YES as long as the team continues winning. And, straight up, it’s unclear that signing Derek Jeter to a big, expensive contract extension is the best way to keep winning.

If the Yankees’ payroll is finite — which has never been entirely clear — and a $20 mil-a-year pledge to Jeter could feasibly keep them out of the bidding for some future free agent stud (also unlikely), then they’d be better off putting some of their considerable resources toward finding a younger, less expensive shortstop. Jeter is still a good player in spite of his shaky defense and diminishing production. But J.J. Hardy, Rafael Furcal and Jose Reyes — all years younger than Jeter and all currently slated for free agency next offseason — posted similar or better WARs in 2010. Jeter is hardly irreplaceable.

Barring unforeseen circumstances, Jeter will still be rich, handsome, bound for the Hall of Fame and dating Minka Kelly regardless of where he signs this offseason, so it’s hard to say he’ll lose all that much by leaving the Yankees. But he’ll stand to lose money — both contractually and likely due to fewer endorsements — and he’ll forever forgo some of that mystical “True Lifelong Yankee” legacy he has developed in the Bronx.

So it strikes me that the Yanks could easily call his bluff. Leave the three-year, $50 million on the table and tell him to come back to them if he finds anything better. He won’t.