A prevailing mantra at the end of a baseball offseason — both from fans and front offices — is that a certain player has been “overpaid” or was undesirable at a certain price point.
While obviously no one in their right mind would give a backup catcher $20 million a year, in a sports league like MLB, which operates without a salary cap, it seems silly for fans and general managers to believe that giving a player a certain amount of money would make them overpaid.
Any athlete who has reached free agency and has started angling for a new contract did so because they played well enough to command that type of money. They played well enough to field, and in many cases, accept that offer. All you did as a fan was get mad. In these situations when a top notch player goes to a new club for more opportunities, financial and otherwise, they should be celebrated for cashing in on their value when it was at or near its highest.
