Even paying Pujols $30 million a year doesn't automatically kill their flexibility to change and improve the team down the line. Again, this is a big market team that can handle having a $130-$150 million payroll and ideally could handle an even higher one down the road. It's not an either/or proposition. Never said it was. But putting 20-25% of your payroll into one player will certainly limit your flexibility to an extent. Sure, to a relative extent. So will paying one $27 million a year, or $25 million, or even $20 million. That said, however, none of us know what the Cubs' financial situation will be 5+ years from now. Personally, I don't see them decreasing the payroll or even maintaining the current one. Like I said, if they're at a point 5-10 years from now where they cannot maintain a payroll at or above $130 million then they've failed. Or something catastrophic has happened to the Ricketts and/or their money. And yes, putting 20% of your payroll sounds crippling when you have a payroll of, say, $60 million, but if you're a big market team like the Cubs that can and should maintain a payroll around $150 million then that still leaves you a ton of room to work with. We're not talking about the situation of the last 5 years where you had the impending sale throwing limiting everything money-wise after the big Soriano spending spree and a bad FO behind it.