Everyone who takes umbrage with the way baseball's salary structure has been set up always talks about the Yankees and how they always have the best players on a bloated payroll. While this is true, it's important to note that they wouldn't get so much scorn if they weren't also successful.
The Yankees are in one of their longest ever World Series droughts, but have started to build back. They will get back to the post season this year and with aggressive moves at the deadline, it's clear that they intend to make a deep run this time around.
To make those moves, the Yankees needed to put together a farm system that would produce talented enough players that other teams may desire them. Also, they recognized that great teams aren't necessarily bought from top to bottom. In addition to the assets developed internally for trade purposes, they also have a healthy number of players on the Major League roster, headed by guys like Aaron Judge and Gary Sanchez.
While the Yankees get the rap for buying their team, just down the road and in the National League, you can find the Philadelphia Phillies, quietly bumbling along with their store bought team. The Phillies certainly don't have the historic track record of the Yankees, but they have definitely tried to emulate the purported team building techniques of the Bronx Bombers.
Philadelphia has, in two different seasons signed the biggest name on the free agent market, first on offense with Bryce Harper, then a pitcher, Zach Wheeler. The Phillies also traded for and extended J.T. Realmuto, and kept signing more and more free agents. Not a single one of their every day players now was developed in the Phillies system.
And now, they are in a dog fight for the NL East, in contention because of division mediocrity. They are only 4 games over .500, and worse still, they were unable to supplement their team beyond Kyle Gibson and Ian Kennedy at the deadline because of a dearth of top end minor league talent.
The Phillies are trying to be just like the Yankees, which makes sense. The Yankees are one of the mot successful teams in baseball history. Philadelphia, though, is really bad at it.
