Well if you don't know what the limit should be, how can you say the Yankees are "abusing the system?" They are free, under current rules, to spend as much as they want. I might point out that they didn't pay 13 million to Kevin Brown. They didn't pay 18 million to Manny Ramirez. They didn't pay 250 million to Arod. The Yankees have not been the ones pushing individual salaries higher. The Dodgers, the red Sox, the Rockies and others have done that. As for buying a title, how do you think you put together a quality team? Good vibrations? All the teams in the post-season are in the very top of the payroll range: 90-118 million. Someone is going to be on top. Until everyone is brought under some sort of revenue sharing or cap, why should George let up? The other teams won't. They are the ones driving the salaries up.
Because they feel they need to spend twice as much as the average team and a hefty percentage over the #2 just to feel like they have a competitive team?. Are they that bad that they feel that if they 'only' spent $100 million instead of $130 (while other competitors is spending $60-$70-$80 million...what are the Mariner & Red Sox payrolls, anyway?) that they would outright suck?
They are free, under current rules, to spend as much as they want. I might point out that they didn't pay 13 million to Kevin Brown. They didn't pay 18 million to Manny Ramirez. They didn't pay 250 million to Arod.
If you're going to bring that up, than I have to agree. They've been very wise in who they give their money to, but the point still stands that they're the only team who can afford to sign every player they bring up and still add more via free agency. Nothing wrong with that, but they're not going to get any respect by winning that way, and when they lose like last year, it looks even worse. Mike Tyson could probably smash a pretty good featherweight fighter, but if he did, why should we care?