[TroyF]

OK guys, you want comedy? Put the thing on equalize cities and watch what happens. I'll never go this route, partly because I'm not sure any AI could truly handle this. You have the Yankees and Sox with ridiculous payrolls and they have to cut cash, quick. (I will use equalize cities, I just won't do it with real players)

The Yankees trade Giambi, Sheffield, Jeter, Johson and Damon to TB. They get back three scrubs.

Instant Payroll reversal.

The RedSox and Royals, not to be outdone, pull off their own monster. Manny and Mike Lowell for four Royals, the best of which is Jeremy Affeldt.

Yikes.

As you would expect, many of the small market names are kept by their own teams. Cabrera goes nowhere. The biggest FA signing is Mark Prior to the Cardinals for 15.4 over 5. With the injury history of Prior that may sound bad, but in the game his health is a 76 and he had put up a monster Cy Young season with the Cubs which included an ERA of 2.45 and 243K's in 231 innings.

With a rating of 93 and being 26, the contract isn't as ridiculous as it might first appear.

After an injury filled year, Chase Utley signed for 6 million a year over 6, instead of the monster he received last time. All in all, with the eual cities function on, more teams were active, the signings appeared to be for less overall and there were still some bigtime FA's available and signed. Roger Clemens went to the Pirates for 1 year at 4 million as an end note here.