Interesting article about net win shares on The Hardball Times.  

http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/2007-net-win-shares-value/

Among the highlights/lowlights:

Colon, Bartolo   @   ($9,949,934) was the worst value of 2007
followed by Angel fan favorite: Kendall, Jason @     ($9,118,644)

To further prove the genius of our neighbors to the north and south:

"worst teams in free agent Net Win Shares Value were...

LAD     -$21,585,751
OAK     -$19,427,113

the Dodgers' other free agent deals almost all tanked, including Schmidt (-$8.7 million), Brett Tomko (-$4.5 million), Rafael Furcal (-$4.4 million) and Juan Pierre (-$4.3 million). Even waiver pickup Esteban Loaiza was a negative value (-$2.5 million)."

Bill Stoneman doesn't look so bad compared to what the Dodgers were doing.  At least the bulk of Stoneman's risks were 1 year deals.  In the case of Bartolo, he did win a CY Young and it's difficult to predict that a pitcher is going to have back, shoulder and forearm injuries.  

I like seeing the A's right there on that list too.  Hopefully Lew will provide Beane some more cash to spend so that he can turn around and flush it down the toilet.  I'd get even more pleasure out of beating the A's for the division if I didn't have to hear their fans whine about being small market.  Beane has yet to prove that when he does have cash, he can invest it wisely.  In fact, I could have missed a few things but it seems as though the A's have been fading steadily in the farm system since DePodesta left.  Coincidence or not, Beane's star is starting to fade.