and the problem is Jed's terrible at actually spending efficiently; all the avenues for doing so have proven mostly fruitless
amateur draft: seemingly getting better last few years but just Steele ('14) and Nico ('18) are really the only significant contributors from 2014-2023 drafts, which is just such an abysmal performance from the org. in that dept (not including Happ here anymore who's already expensive)
rule 5 draft: [file not found]
IFA: Assad (ZiPS-U: projected 0.9 WAR), Morel (0.7) and Amaya (0.3) is basically all there is despite plenty of monetary efforts
trade: Busch, PCA, Brown
reclamation projects/bargain bin FA: Tauchmann, Leiter Jr., T. Miller
unproven/risky FA: Shota
i'd probably argue all but #4 are downright awful compared to the average org and then the rest of our biggest performing players (currently nobody is even projecting for 4 WAR) are all basically being paid market rate values
it all amounts to a FO who have performed capably at paying sticker price for some established decent players and more or less failed miserably at the rest of their job for about the past 5-6 years