I have a much better idea than paying some dude to watch some Peruvian kid play stickball. Teams with traditionally lousy pitching should pound the pavement and search Third World hospital birth records for babies born with birth defects. Specifically, extra fingers. Beginning at the age of 4, teach them how to throw a slider and a curveball. By the time they turn 20, they'll be virtually unhittable.

Santonio Alfonso Gomeiquez, the new pitching ace of the 2026 Cleveland Indians, master of the six-finger sinker.

Scouts cost (counting salary and all expenses) less than the major league minimum. You can get six good ones for the annual cost of one mediocre free agent. If they find you one major-leaguer every three years, they're more than worth the money.

It's even less expensive to run a Latin American operation– you can sign 50 teenagers for pesos. Even if 47 of them bust out, you're still making out.

And yet, the teams that suck, year in and year out, always have the smallest scouting staffs. But they always have money to waste on signing cadavers to big-bucks contracts.

Two years ago, Kansas City signed Jose Guillen $36 million for three years. Two years and $24 Big Ones later, he's hit .257 (702 OPS) in 950 at-bats. That $24 million would have run the finest scouting operation in baseball for 5-10 years.

This year they acquired Yuniesky Betancourt– one of the worst players in baseball. They gave up two prospects–and took on about $7 million in salary until 2011– to get a player with a .690 OPS.

In 2006, Pittsburgh handed Damaso Marte– a 30-year-old middle reliever– $6 million. A year later, they traded for the $11 million contract of Matt Morris (32 and at the point of his career where he was an "innings-eater").

Posnanski's vintage whine dismisses the possibility of teams using the Moneyball approach, because teams like Boston and New York pay better. He fails to mention that Kansas City was the home of Bill James– the guy who started crunching all those numbers.

He fails to mention that more than one Kansas City media outlet suggested that the Royals talk to James (who was a diehard fan) and that the Royals disparaged James's work for close to two decades.

Eventually the Red Sox picked him up for chump change (a lot less than the major-league minimum). And his first recommendation, according to 60 Minutes, was "you guys ought to sign this David Ortiz guy who just got cut by the Twins".

For what the Indians have wasted on Trot Nixon, Jason Michaels, David Dellucci, Jason Johnson, Mas Kpbayashi, et al., they could have scouts in every country in Latin America (where they get most of their good players). For what the Orioles have wasted on overpriced free agents, they could own a couple of those countries.

Yes, it's quite difficult to compete with teams who can outspend you by 5-600%. But when small-market teams don't use the strategies that permit them to compete more efficiently– when they imitate the most self-destructive and useless strategies of the big teams– it's hard to have any sympathy for them.

Try living in Baltimore, Toronto, Cincinnati, Kansas City, Oakland, Pittsburgh….where the owners could easily say: "Sorry, no .500 season again this year, no playoffs, no World Series, no hope, and no future."

I completely agree with Alan T. when he says that Tribe "fans" are among the absolute worst in all of baseball. And may I just add, the dumbest.

"Savoring and chewing over your dainties is as close to you as your dog is ever going to get without becoming you. Just understand your underpants hold scents that are the essence of you — a dear dog's delight. Why should your well-behaved cocker spaniel chomp into your boyfriend's briefs when he can chow down on yummy panties containing secrets of the goddess who rescued him?"

I do feel bad for the Pirates – because I know someone in their organization – and for KC and Cincinnati. But its never going to change until there's a salary cap and the field is evened out across the board. For me, its just not fun to watch the same teams/golfers/NASCAR drivers win over and over and over again. Even if I have a hometown team to pull for.

But it's really hard to make it down to blog #3 on the Ohio.Com blogroll when the top one is headlined by "Pup fascinated with underpants"