Or a farm system being pillaged by the previous regime which is our current problem with mutiple unmovable contracts. In a perfect world you don't give a 33-year old DH a three year deal so you have to pay another team to take him. Avoiding that situation all together would have been great.
I'm not saying our current front office can't make this team competitive in other ways but basically they were shot in the foot on day one and still have to run the race.