Definitely wouldn't disagree - which is why I was never a big Wren guy. However, given that the team was contending to a point, I can't say that I felt that he deserved too much criticism for making win-now types of moves with the nucleus they had at the time.
My main gripe with the Wren era was the same as most - drafting and signing mostly higher-floor, lower-ceiling types. A lot of those wouldn't have been that bad IF the money was going to be there to keep that group together for the long haul, but Wren was apparently the only person that believed Liberty/McGuirk/JS was going to expand payroll to make that happen.