[alnorth]

Upon further reflection, I can see that we are not winning any tie-breakers with Washington. We would have had to blow them away, and its not hard to imagine if we had marginally beaten their offer that Jackson would have said no.

First, they want a big payday. If Jackson has a great year, he'll be able to command a big 4-5 year deal in 2013 that we aren't handing out to him. It would have been just one really good year and we got our own players we want to extend. (by the way, when the hell are we extending Gordon? His arbitration hearing is coming up) Washington doesn't have this massive farm system coming up, if he becomes a fan favorite in 2012, they may pay him and Boras off.

That aside, Washington was close to .500 last season, they have big pitching names to surround him with, and they don't have the decade-plus long stigma of being losers. Its fine for us to believe our time is almost here and that on paper things look up, but most of them aren't Gil Meche. A lot of free agents are going to have to see us win first before they'd be willing to come to KC. We may never have been players this offseason, but if we finish a strong second this year (or hell, even beat Detroit), then free agents will be a lot more open to playing here.