The biggest problem is not so much the lack of a level playing field, but the lack of trading partners in leagues with many unmanaged teams. It's pretty hard to rebuild a team when a substantial number of better players are locked up on unmanaged teams.
Contraction is part of the fix for that in that it can improve some of the poorer teams enough that more managers won't quit. The smarter, harder working managers will still perform above expectations.

I think PB value has been way off in the past year, though. It seems to me that in previous years it was a better predictor of team value than before, or did I just start to notice?

Dave N