International baseball has been in the news often lately with the ongoing saga of Yoan Moncada (he’s in America now), the signing of Yasmany Tomas and yesterday’s news that Cuba-U.S. relations could be getting much better.  In recent news, at the yearly international scouting directors’ meeting at the Winter Meetings last week, sources tell me there was no talk about the recent controversial rule change and no talk about an international draft, as expected.

So much has been happening lately that you may have temporarily forgotten about last summer, when the Yankees obliterated the international amateur spending record (and recently added another prospect). If the early rumors and innuendo are any indication, the rest of baseball isn’t going to let the Yankees have the last word.

I already mentioned the Cubs as one of multiple teams expected to spend well past their bonus pool starting on July 2nd, 2015.  I had heard rumors of other clubs planning to get in the act when I wrote that, but the group keeps growing with each call I make, so I decided to survey the industry and see where we stand.  After surveying about a dozen international sources, here are the dozen clubs that scouts either are sure, pretty sure or at least very suspicious will be spending past their bonus pool, ranked in order of likelihood:

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The main good thing about reaching the World Series is that it means you won your league. When you win your league, people like you a lot, and it’s a good feeling. Builds community. Another, bigger-picture good thing about reaching the World Series is that it brings in revenue, especially if you haven’t been real good for a while. New streams of money begin to flow, and preexisting streams of money flood their banks, as more people express interest in the product and other people express more interest in the product. Basically, if you get to the World Series, it’s a good thing for more than just the day or week of.

When the Royals came out of nowhere to come within a few runs of the championship, it stood to reason they’d reap an enormous benefit. An area love affair was re-kindled, as Kauffman Stadium became one of the loudest and most popular environments in the game. Estimates varied, but there was no question the World Series appearance would mean, for the team, some additional tens of millions of dollars. How much could that money mean, if re-invested in the roster? What would Dayton Moore be able to pull off, given greater financial flexibility?

The Royals re-signed Luke Hochevar for a couple of years, which seems like a good deal even given Hochevar’s operation. But lately the Royals have spent bigger money. They committed $17 million to Kendrys Morales. They committed $11 million to Alex Rios. And, most recently, they committed $20 million to Edinson Volquez. This is what the World Series has meant, in a way. It’s rather underwhelming.

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Everybody remembers the movie Inception, right? Nice visuals, convoluted premise, and that killer score – a more than sufficient popcorn delivery system. Fun fact: the main plot point of inception, that an idea can be planted in someone’s subconscious without them realizing, is real!

At some point this summer, exasperated Texas Rangers writer/blogger/fanalyst Jamey Newberg tweeted something to the effect of “Alex Rios is one of those players whose production will never line up with his numbers.” At first, I was offended. A player produces what he produces, his numbers reflect his….production. But the thought, the idea that a player is less than his final stat line, it stayed with me. I couldn’t shake it.

Then the offseason rolled around. The crop of available outfielders is charitably described as “very much ungood” and then a bunch of guys signed. One of those signees, Nick Markakis got four years and an AAV north of $11 million, to the surprise of many. And then, piling shock on top of shock, Rios himself signed a one-year deal with the Royals for $11 million.

There are plenty of reasons to scoff at the big outfielders contract. Entering his age-34 season, Rios comes off a rough season in Texas. He produced right at replacement level in 2014, displaying a worrisome lack of power (just four home runs and a career-low .118 ISO) and he missed time with injury, as older players are wont to do.

But more than most players, Rios’ problems are matters of perception. There are many reasons to not like Rios as a player or this signing in a vacuum, all factors that I believe contribute to the shrugs and disbelief when news of his Kansas City contract broke.

Most pressing, the concern expressed by the Rangers fan above: does his production lag behind his numbers?

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In the weeks when between Billy Butler’s contract was bought out and today, with Kendrys Morales brought to Kansas City on a two-year, $17 million deal, the Royals ranked dead-last in FanGraphs’ projected Designated Hitter Depth Charts. Not dead-last amongst American League teams: Dead. Last. Less projected WAR from their DH spot than 15 NL teams, none of which actually employ a designated hitter.

With Morales now in Kansas City, one can see that the Royals have now soared up the depth chart rankings…up to the #24 position, with an estimated 0.6 WAR now due to emit from this spot in the lineup. The Texas Rangers now have the dishonor at being the lowest-ranked AL team, headlined by the light-hitting combination of Mitch Moreland and Rougned Odor. The Royals are now only just ahead of the Miami Marlins (featuring a rotation of Justin Bour/Jeff Baker/Donovan Solano/Derek Dietrich) and the Philadelphia Philles (Darin Ruf/Grady Sizemore/Cesar Hernandez/Cameron Rupp/Maikel Franco).

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Someday, an up-and-coming SABR scientist should try to measure the psychic effect that losing has on ballplayers. As everyone knows from watching “The Natural,” losing is a disease — as contagious as polio, syphilis and bubonic plague. Attacking one but infecting all, though some more than others. And no other major leaguer over the past decade, among hitters, lost as frequently as Josh Willingham did.

Willingham, 35, recently announced his retirement after playing nine full seasons and parts of two more. What a relief it must have been for him to finish as a part-timer with the Kansas City Royals, who made it to the seventh game of the World Series. Only once before had Willingham played significant time for winning team (with the Florida Marlins in 2008), and never had he played in the postseason. Cross it off the list, call it a career. And it was a good one, aside from all of the losing.

Overall, his teams went 503-644 in Willingham’s appearances, producing a .439 winning percentage, the worst among anyone who recorded at least 4,000 plate appearances since he broke into the majors in 2004. It usually wasn’t Willingham’s fault that his team lost; he was the best hitter on the Marlins as a rookie, after Miguel Cabrera, and he was better than Hanley Ramirez. He was the fourth-best hitter in ’07, the third-best in ’08 — and in ’09 and ’10 after being traded to the Washington Nationals. He was the best hitter on the Oakland Athletics in 2011, and the Minnesota Twins in 2012.  It’s just that Willingham’s teams lost anyway.

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There was precedent for Wade Davis‘ amazing Royals transformation. You could, for example, point to Wade Davis, in 2012. Or you could point to any number of other guys who’ve found comfortable homes in the bullpen after struggling as starters. But a year before Davis turned into an unhittable Royals reliever — that is, the same year that Davis was a very much hittable Royals starter — there was, in the same uniform, Luke Hochevar. Hochevar, for years, was a very mediocre starter. In 2013, he took off in relief, and he projected to be of great help again in 2014, until he blew out his elbow at the start of spring training.

So, Hochevar had Tommy John surgery. And the Royals, famously, didn’t miss him. They rode defense and their bullpen almost all the way to a championship, and then they arrived at more or less the present day. And after paying Hochevar millions of dollars to not pitch in 2014, the Royals are going to pay Hochevar millions of dollars to hopefully pitch in 2015 and beyond. Word’s out that Hochevar has re-signed as a free agent, for two years and $10 million, and now one’s left to wonder what the Royals might do about their roster construction.

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The Arizona Fall League championship game (domestic professional baseball’s de facto funeral for the year) featured superlative performances from a number of prospects that may have piqued your curiosity. Here’s a look at how, after nearly two months of evaluating these players, I feel things will play out moving forward.

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Remember when Billy Butler stole a base against the Angels in the playoffs? Of course you do. It was beautiful and it was absurd, and it psychologically cemented the notion that there was nothing the Angels could do to slow the Royals down. Even Billy Butler was having his way, however he wanted to. It was like the Royals flying their flag over the Angels’ conquered castle. And it had to be Butler. It felt meaningful because that’s something Butler just doesn’t do. There are reasons he doesn’t run, so when he ran, and when he got away with it, the Royals felt invincible.

Here’s an image sequence that should remind you of how the moment felt:

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Madison Bumgarner pitched quite a bit this past season. Including the regular and post season, he threw a total of 4,074 pitches, which wasn’t even the season’s top total; James Shields bested him by throwing six more, for a total of 4,080 pitches in 2014, not including spring training. So with all of the pitches thrown this season (and one month less of rest), how should we expect these two to produce next season? Let’s look at some comparable pitchers.

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It was following a half-decent season in 2013 that Royals general manager Dayton Moore said he felt a little like he’d won the World Series. The remark didn’t go over very well locally or nationally, and Moore conceded later he could’ve chosen better words, but at the core of a poorly-worded sentence was a legitimate message. Moore sensed that people were getting into the Royals again. Even though the team that season had fallen a little short of the playoffs, the roster was at least competitive, and the fans at least had a product to watch. What Moore meant to say was that the franchise was restoring its bonds with the city around it, after too many years of two-way neglect.

The bonds are restored now. They maybe have never been stronger. After a year of no playoffs, Moore felt like he’d won a title, so I can’t imagine how he feels after a year of coming one win away. The fans are in love again. Many of the fans, they were always in love, but they’re once again willing to act on it. And new fans have been gained, as well, fans who previously never gave baseball a second thought. Consider one anecdote, to represent many:

People are wearing blue proudly again. People filled Kauffman Stadium proudly again. People are chanting proudly again. Last year put the Royals back on the map; this year circled the Royals with dark ink and arrows. The fans sense an opening window of contention, and as heartbreaking as it is to lose in a seventh game, this doesn’t have to have been the last chance. The Royals could be back, and they could be powered in no small part by gains from having made so deep a run.

All that success, all that restored loyalty and enthusiasm — that’s money. What’s more, that’s money the Royals weren’t even budgeting for. I’ve never been confused for a financial wizard, or for any kind of wizard, but what the Royals have been gaining is pure profit, and the gains aren’t going to end with the playoff run. As a matter of fact, the Royals will be benefiting from this past month for a good while yet.

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