Can Middle Payroll Teams Win it All?

[Trov]

This is not about the Twins in specific, but all middle of the road payroll teams, and the half in half out plans many seam to run with.  The recent letting go of Falvey got me thinking about it though.  First, with baseball being uncapped and no floor each team can pay whatever they feel comfortable with.  Before the 1995 strike most teams resigned their free agents if they were star players, and really it was the mid level guys or vets that still wanted to play a couple more years that did much movement.  Rarely did you see a star leave the team that drafted them for a big contract.

That is in part because owners had an unwritten rule they would not try to sign them like that.  Then the strike happened, and the gloves came off.  Then big time free agents started getting record deals over and over.  The Yankees had many of them, but many teams stepped up.  The Rangers, Red Sox, Seattle, and many others would make splashes. Gone were the draft, international signings, and trades to build your teams, the superstar free agents were the wave.  You can debate if that worked out well or not, I normally argue it has not.

However, it lead to the "rebuilding" for small and mid-market teams overall.  The big market teams would keep throwing money at their roster holes each year, but the small and mid-market teams started to do the "playoff window" rebuild routes.  You would see teams lose for several years, some even on purpose (Houston) to build up draft classes and international signing pools to then say "all-in" when the time was right.  KC did to success, Houston did it too(despite not being a small or mid-market team).  Oakland would pop up from time to time, Tampa was floating on finding the diamonds in the rough and fleecing bad GM's in trades, Bill Smith of Twins being one of them.  

The Twins had an approach that they wanted to be relevant year after year and not go the "rebuild" to "all-in" approach as some smaller to mid-market teams doing.  This led to playoff loss after playoff loss and never having a team people thought would win it all.  Then Falvey came in and it was more of the same, one foot in and one foot out.  He would try to sign some bigger names, that never worked out all that well in the long run, he made some big trades and would trade the vet for prospects and then prospects for vets shifting pieces all around.  He never did a full all in, or full rebuild.  I think that was the plan keep them relevant but do not over risk. 

So that brings me to the question on the title, can a mid-payroll team win it all?  Can a team not committed to going all in or full rebuild really make a run?  We saw in years past the Marlins do the all in, spend huge for one year be a big splash and then sell off guys to try and do it again the future. We saw KC win it all after doing a long rebuild then went all in to try and get one more title, only to lead to another long rebuild.  

I would say if you can make the playoffs anything can happen, even more so in baseball, but constantly not drafting top talents leads to blah teams.  I do not think the half in measures will ever lead to big success in seasons, and I personally prefer the ups and downs of rebuilding waves.  Sure you have a couple of bad years, but it can lead to excitement when all the young kids come up through the system together and win at the same time.  Then frustration when it gets tore down to the studs again.  Is that better than seeing late season collapses?  I guess it is up to your preference. 

Either way, I do not think a team can have long term success sitting in the middle.  Either spend on the FA to stay relevant, or go full youth movement with low payroll for awhile. 

[tony&rodney]

One has to be reasonable about the level of spending. Some examples .... The Cardinals have been #6-15 in spending over the last 25 years. Money became tight and they have had to step back in spending; The Padres were usually in the 20s in terms of spending but an owner with a terminal illness spent wildly and now the Padres are forced with cutting back where they are able to do so despite selling out every game.

The failure of MLB to have a reasonable distribution of all media and attendance revenues is a problem. It seems like that may be difficult to sort out. It really is a job for the owners. The players receive less of a percentage of revenue in baseball than the other three sports often discussed. 

The recent difficulties by the Pohlad Corporation with handling money highlights the troubles now for Twins fans. Slim budgets are nothing new for Milwaukee and Tampa Bay. Can any team win the World Series? Yes, but the odds are very low, very low. Milwaukee is built to win over the course of a 162 game season if all goes well and it has recently. They do not have the absolute star power and bevy of experienced power arms that the Dodgers roll out. 

MLB is a mess and only the owners can clean it up. Will they? Last season the Dodgers had a ton of injuries and won in seven games in the end. What happens if the dodgers are real lucky with health? They might win 130 games. Does that make a difference? Ask the owners what they want? They are in control. We just watch the games.