You will never get to the irreducible definition of anything because you will never be able to explain why you want to explain, and so on. The system will gobble itself up.
I'm an actor. My life as an actor depends on who sends me what. I'm just taking the best stuff that I can find that's sent my way, regardless of how big or little the paycheck is. I don't want to work for scale anymore. I'm at a point now where, no matter how good something is, I'm not going to kill myself and end up in the hole.
I'm not going to tell people how to live their life and I surely wouldn't tell people my life is the way you should be living. People get to choose what they do want to do with their life and I appreciated that.
If you want to get a deal, negotiate with the teams yourself. Say, "I want this much, and no less, but I'll show up to camp on time." It doesn't seem that hard to me.