Goldilocks and the three contracts

Derek Jeter isnt as good as he used to be?

Fine.

But…

Lets compare numbers:

Player A: 179 H, 111 R, 30 2B, 10 HR, 63 BB, 106 SO
Player B: 184 H, 110R, 30 2B, 19 HR, 46 BB, 104 SO
Player C: 164 H, 106 R, 46 2B, 27 HR, 82 BB, 147 SO

…One of those 3 is Mr Jeter. The others are the other 2 big name/contract singings of the offseason, Werth and Crawford. All of em are seemingly on par with one another, except Werth has more power-but more Ks, Jeter has less powerbut is on base more, and Crawford is right in between-not too special in comparison.
So, yeah, equals…

One of them was signed to a big contract and it was seen as a joke
One of them was signed to a big contract and it was seen as excessive
One of them was signed to a big contract and it was seen as a good move

How is that possible? Unless you factor in bias towards teams signing the players.

I love how the Nationals just threw all that money at one player. It proves that no one is holding a gun to the other 28 teams and saying “Only the Yankees/Red sox are allowed to spend that much money”

It also proves that just because youre one of the biggest free agents out there, then your choices are immediatly limited to just two or three cities

The Nationals are building a contender here. Take some homegrown talent, add in a couple well scouted signings and finish it off with one or two big name free agents? Reminds me of 1996.

So what Im really trying to ask here is : Why are people mocking the Nationals for this?

Could it be that theres another team out there besides the obvious two that is actually *gasp* willing to spend money on their team so they can win?!?! Who knows? Maybe theyll shock everything and pull several hundred millions out of nowhere for Cliff Lee. Can you imagine the 2012 Nationals rotation being led by Strasburg and Lee? With Jason Werth and god knows who else in the lineup?

I know I ran a bit off with that, so lemme wrap it up here:

Jeter signs with NYY: Ho-hum, nothing new or interesting.
Crawford signs with BOS: Not bad, but they aint winning the division on that alone.
Werth signs with DC: No major impact right now, but down the line, could be huge.

….and oh yeah, Boston also aquired Adrien Gonzalez for what I believe to be their entire farm system. This is awesome because they are officially FUCCKED after 2012 when a bunch of their high profile players start hitting free agency and theyll have little to no money to work with…hell, their in trouble right now because they have no farm system to address any other needs they have, let alone any injuries next year.
That reminds me a lot of the Mets right now. All these big names, 0 farm team, 0 chance.