A-Rod Salary: Astros Team Combined Payroll Is Less Than The Yankee Makes In A Year? Find Out How Much!

Alex Rodriguez will make more money this upcoming season than all of the Houston Astros combined.

And the most staggering fact about this is that the Yankees third baseman will miss at least half the season to recover from hip surgery.

A-Rod's $29 million salary tops the major leagues for the 13th straight season, according to a study of major-league contracts by the Associated Press.

The New York Yankees are expected to have the highest payroll on opening day for the 15th straight year, even surpassing the Los Angeles Dodgers $228 million payroll.

With teams due to set opening-day rosters Sunday, the Yankees' payroll will be nearly 10 times the spending of the Houston Astros, who have shrunk their overall payroll to about $25 million.

While their budget is low, the Astros' hopes remain high.

"When we get on the baseball field with whomever the opponent is, they are not sitting there saying: 'Well, their players make more money than us, so therefore you're deemed a winner and we're deemed a loser,'" Astros manager Bo Porter said Thursday.

A-Rod is followed on the money list by Philadelphia pitcher Cliff Lee, who will make $25 million. Out of the top six highest played players in the MLB, four of them wear Yankee pinstripes: Rodriguez who will start the season on the DL, Yankees first baseman Mark Teixeira rounds it out at sixth for $23.1 million, newly acquired Wells is fourth at $24.6 million and pitcher CC Sabathia is fifth at $24.3 million.

Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig comments on the spending decisions.

"You have to understand where you are and not be afraid then to do what you have to do,'' he said. "Outside of building a good farm system, I don't see how you will remain competitive.''

The price of competing keeps going up. The average salary projects to about $3.67 million, up about $200,000 from the start of last season.

Although the staggering salaries and continual increase in price per player is making fans and analysts alike wonder, are the players really worth this much money? If a player isn't even playing for at least half of the season, how can you justify paying him more than an entire team makes?

What do you think of A-Rod's $29 million salary?