a) He has been in the Championship for nearly half a decade. That track record comes at a price. Saying he would be a free agent is nonsense, as free agents typically require higher wages as there is no transfer fee involved and they can pick their club without any interference from who owns the player's registration, so the overall cost to SUFC is rarely cheaper
b) You say he is not good enough immediately after where you ask where you said he was not good enough. A back up/squad player at his age is not good enough to start by definition, and has limited to zero runway to progress to be a starter. Anyone in that sort of squad position who is going to be wanting decent Championship wages is a waste of money. Any player who is 5+ years younger who is either in our development system already, or can be brought in, would not offer any significant drop off in performance for when he is actually needed and come at a fraction of the price, with infinitely more upside
Note I speak as someone who didn't want to offload Slater in the first place. I like him as a player. I would make this argument if there was a carbon copy of the player who had spent their years bouncing around Preston and Blackburn and had no history with us. Spending more money than you need to on a player you're not going to use when you don't have a lot of it is horrific business.
