From time to time. It doesn't matter though. The numbers are a lot more informative then what you perceive watching the games. No matter how much you want to pretend that he's not an above-average player, you're wrong. Objectively wrong.
Not sure what's funny. His contract is bad, but the overall package is an above-average player. He's a very good offensive shortstop, and very good baserunner.
http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=ss&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2014&month=0&season1=2014&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&sort=17,d
Shortstop wRC+ leaderboard, because some people need to be reminded.
Not lack of effort. Lack of resources. You can't claim that there is money there, and then go almost two years without making any additions. Well, you can, but you're either awful at your job or lying about money being there.
I'm not even sure what would be worse, management having lied about payroll space, or management having payroll space and still being too ineffective to acquire someone with more than a $3 million salary over the last 18 months.