What do you mean it averages 27.5% of the 2012 payroll? It only accounts for a percentage of the 2012 payroll once. It's pretty clear with all the money that most non-Cubs teams are willing to spend on players that money is expected to be there to afford all these players. Cincy's current payroll is roughly double what it was 7 years ago. If it doubles again that percentage will plummet. The obsession with payroll flexibility really confuses me. I would much rather have really good players than the flexibility to sign mediocrity. The Reds are closer to median payroll now than they were in 2004 which was the last time they were down that low. There isn't as much room for them to grow anymore, so they are dependent on MLB growing salaries across the board. I used the 2012 number because that's the only payroll number we know as of the moment so that served as a baseline. Obviously as I mentioned that percentage will go down as the payroll increases, but I would be stunned if there payroll was double or really anywhere close in the next 7-10 years. Payroll flexibility has to be balanced with the scarcity of playing time. For the Cubs, playing time is more scarce then money, so signing stars to that sort of deal makes sense. For the Reds, payroll flexibility is a big deal. They'll have some difficulty surrounding him in the early years because of how much his salary is, and in the later years he'll decline. That's a big problem. It's an even bigger one when they could trade him and get major assets back for him from a team who doesn't have to be as concerned by the financials. http://cincinnati.com/blogs/reds/2012/02/11/more-scary-news-on-tv-front-for-reds/?odyssey=obinsite the reds current tv deal is a joke, it's not unreasonable to think they'll be right there along with everyone else and get a real deal that allows them to significantly up the payroll in a few years. Is the potential for TV deals really that significant for cities with one sports network and no ability to form their own? Obviously they'll get an increase thanks to the huge increase in demand for live programming, but it's not like they have a lot of leverage.