The accelerating teardown in Seattle made this question from the Ask BD thread increasingly of interest:
With Seattle and Cleveland (albeit from much higher starting points) cutting salary – has this changed viewpoints of what small market teams ‘can’ afford in non playoff years?
I’m not sure about Cleveland as they haven’t really done anything yet beyond discussing the possibility of trading a pitcher. Seattle has gone a lot further, though, deleting the best starting pitcher, second most valuable position player (by fWAR), highest salaried player and star closer from an 89-win team, while also reportedly spreading word that they want to be rid of their longtime third baseman.