How many FAs at any position are worth half of what they end up getting? FA is a bad investment. Thats why it is pivotal to develop players within your system. The last step of development is the majors. Players need to play to get better in the majors. This is why Pie should be playing. this is completely untrue. In most cases Free Agents are signed at the end or past prime. They will in most cases get paid more than they were getting paid for declining production. Young players coming up get paid less while there production is improving. I know there is individual cases where players are still improving after free agency, but there are cases where it was better to not where a seat belt in a car accident. I would contend that the percentages tend to show free agency as a bad tool to build a winning ballclub(unless you are willing to spend like the Yankees). As for the part of young players need time to develop in the Majors, I dont know what to tell you. For every Pujols and Braun there are 20 DLees and ARams. Most players dont have ROY numbers right off the bat. They need to play to get better. once again, this isn't true No, it's true. The thing that isn't true however is the insinuation that you shouldn't sign any free agent. You have to, there's really no way around it. You have to overpay for some of your production, because it's simply impossible to get it all, and get enough, strictly from the cheap youth. There's no room for error doing it that way. no it isnt true. Great arguments.