FSN-Houston’s Greg Lucas on Wandy Rodriguez’s upcoming arbitration with the Astros:
Rodriguez doesn’t lose no matter what the decision is. He made about $2.6 million in 2010. No wonder an awful lot of baseball owners rue the day they agreed to arbitration to settle contract disputes. The players always win. The owners offer raises-in Wandy’s case almost doubling his salary--but may have to pay even more if the arbitrator rules such.
The scoreboard may show the owners “winning” a decent percentage of the actual arbitrator’s decisions, but they still pay out more money than they had the year before.