It is "smarter." I don't dispute that. It's also, however, a recipe for a work stoppage. I understand the wisdom of what Pittsburgh is doing, but the "Moneyball" idea of exploiting market inefficiencies is also becoming a way to justify not paying for production. If you're a really good player in the MLB, there's a strong chance you'll never get a big contract. Seriously. Teams will pay the arb salaries year-by-year, and then you'll hit 31 and they'll say, "You're past your prime." It's a shell game. Don't get me wrong. I don't feel too bad for a guy who makes 20 million in a six year baseball career. But when the owners are running up numbers in the hundreds of millions, even billions, well, it's all relative, isn't it? If I were a young MLB player, I'd be pissed. If I were Jimmy Nelson, I'd be scared. Eventually, the union will get tired of the benefits of the system going to the Stantons and Harpers and Kershaws, and then the owners will have to significantly change the system or face the possibility of a work stoppage. Players are held accountable for results and constantly evaluated. All I'm suggesting is that we see more information on how the owners are managing their obligations, and not just to "efficient spending" either. IMHO, paying guys what they are worth to the extent possible is part of that, in the same way taking care of the environment and giving miners fair benefits is part of a coal company's job. It's not the only thing, or even the biggest thing (certainly we'll all disagree about to what extent it matters--I personally think the social responsibility piece should be much more emphasized across society, but that's just me), but I think it has to be part of the conversation. Just talking about owners as "smart" misses the fact that sometimes they're also being "exploitative," at least relative to baseball, and I think that means we need to have the conversation about what the owners obligations are, understanding that Milwaukee and Pittsburgh are going to have different ones than LA and SF and NY and Chicago. I don't agree with a lot of that, especially because I really don't care how much the owners make, but I agree with the general point. GM's are only looking to sign a player if it's below market value, which is not a bad strategy, but I'm pretty disappointed if Stearns passed on all those short term, (relative to what every other player gets paid) inexpensive relievers because they weren't under market value. I've said it many times, you don't get extra credit for signing only cheap, undervalued players. Last year, having even one half way competent reliever from day 1 gets us to at least the wild card game.