this team does not have revenues comparable to the Yankees or the Red Sox. Local media revenue alone is a huge difference. And the owners are not willing to spend unlimited funds on a baseball team. They want it to pay for itself. I can understand that. The've had to shell out for capital calls in the years prior to the WS and weren't that happy about it as I understand it.

The "investments" in Zito and Rowand are what caused a lot of the current problem. Those contracts convinced the owners that they never ever want to do that again.

And of course $130M for a payroll is actually well above average.

Your viewpoint is pretty much that of a fan who would spend his ass off if he had a billion dollars, not so much that of a businessman who actually has the billion dollars because he's good at business. That's not a knock - if I were filthy rich I'd buy a club and do what you're talking about - but you're ignoring things like having to privately finance the ballpark, not being the only club in the area (unlike Boston) and having a fan base that dwindled to the point where the team almost left town not that long ago. This isn't New York City and the Giants aren't the Yankees.