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Todd SchultzMuch of what you say is just plain wrong. First, going back to your earlier post, please identify for me 3-4 free agents that the Twins lost because they couldn't pay them. Second, please look at the team payrolls before bemoaning how cheap the Twins and A's are--here's the 2007 list:
http://asp.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/salaries/totalpayroll.aspx?year=2007
the A's and Twins were 17th and 18th in payroll, respectively, meaning a dozen other teams were behind them. They were right behind the Braves and Blue Jays--are those teams considered cheap? They were well ahead of the Indians--is the Tribe cheap?
If you added five $15M players to the Twins--that's maybe two starting pitchers and 3 everyday players, you'd just meet the Boston payroll and would still trail the Yankees by 40 MILLION Dollars??!!!!!!! And again, that's pretty much a middle of the pack team--think about how much more the lowest teams would get to add. It can certainly be disheartening for a team in these positions to offer bona fide dollars to players only to have the Yankees, Red Sox and occasionally a couple others just toss a few more million into the kitty and take them away. At some point, you simply have to face the reality of that situation and at best, pick your spots. So please spare me the cheap and doesn't give a damn blather--it's old and inaccurate.
Finally, your quote that the Yanks and the Cards dominated much of the 20th century because they developed the talent through vast minor league systems is laughable, at least for the last half of the century. The Yankees had a farm team all right--in Kansas City, where they would rape the A's on a regular basis to fill needs in exchange for washed-up veterans. Then of course those Yankee farmhands from the 60s' were damn impressive too, leading to how many lower division finishes? Frankly, if free agency hadn't rolled around the Yanks could have sucked for many, many more years. As for the Cardinals, they were hardly dominant during that time either, no more so than the Dodgers or Giants.
You are right about talent winning, that is certainly true. But when the tables are so scewed in terms of revenue generation and salary size, it does make it difficult for many cities/teams to perenially compete at the upper levels. That's a fact of life, at least for the foreseeable future.