FWIW (which isn't much), Bernie is 3rd in the AL in SLB salary in 1998 and first amongst all full-time players in $/PA. In '99 he's first in salary and 2nd to Nomar in $/PA. So he must have been doing something right.
In 2000 he drops down to 7th, which is still WAAAAYYYYYY ahead of Edgar Martinez. In fact, Edgar's highest-salary season (1995) would be Bernie's 2nd-most expensive season, but his 2nd highest-salary season falls below every year of Bernie from 1994 through 2002. Obviously SLB salary is not a perfect analog for real-world value, but it is a compilation of what some fairly competent people thought they were worth in a purely statistical simulation of baseball.