Not saying you're wrong at all, however, Ricketts spending right now isn't for the same reason as the Tribune was, the Tribune spent just to simply boost the teams value more so when they sold the team they would get more for them, look at before that and we never spent that much
from cots:
2013: $106,837,810
2012: $109,316,000
2011: $134,004,000
2010: $144,359,000
2009: $134,809,000
2008: $118,345,833
2007: $ 99,670,332
2006: $ 94,424,499
2005: $ 87,032,933
2004: $ 90,560,000
2003: $ 79,868,333
2002: $ 75,690,833
2001: $ 64,715,833
2000: $ 62,100,000
we were cheap till about 04 when we bumped up 11 mil then down then in 06 was our massive spending spree and look at the difference, backload the contracts then in 09-11 is where you see it balloon. Ricketts came in and cut that off, why wouldn't you? The team at that point was a mess. Old players, no pitching, no farm system. It was time for a rebuild, that coupled with the fact that we weren't all that close to contending when he came in and there wasn't much in the market that we could've added. I've asked D3A in the past and his ideas were horrid, there was simply nothing for us in the market. When Ricketts came in I forget where probably just on boards like this everyone pretty much knew we weren't contending till around 2014 or 15. This upcoming offseason is the one that I care about, because at this point we need to start moving forward. I'm giving Theo 3 years, which is a decent amount of time in my eyes.