"The numbers build off the bonus set for the No. 1 pick, which is $7.2 million this year. Every pick from 2-338 is expressed as a percentage of the No. 1 pick, down to $125,000 for the final picks of the 10th round. A team's total budget for the first 10 rounds is the sum of the numbers for all of its picks, so teams that have extra picks and early picks have more money to spend.
...
Teams can spread the money among their picks in the top 10 rounds in different ways so long as they stay under the total budget. For example, the Astros could sign their No. 1 pick for $5.2 million and spread the extra $2 million among other players. However, if a team fails to sign a player, it cannot apply the budgeted amount for that pick to other players and loses that amount from its overall budget.
Also, bonuses for players signed after the first 10 rounds do not count against the overall budget, unless they exceed $100,000."

The Royals have the 17th-most to spend, with $6.1M.

" **Kansas City Royals outfield prospect Wil Myers was hampered by injuries last year for Double-A Northwest Arkansas, hitting .254/.353/.393 with less power than anticipated, although he still impressed scouts with his tools and offensive potential and was only 19 years old. Returning to NW Arkansas this season, he's hitting .333/.366/.641 through nine games, although his BB/K has deteriorated with a 2/14 mark in 39 at-bats. The strikeout rate is much higher than last year, with a lower walk rate. Is he boosting his power output by being more aggressive, and will this backfire at higher levels? Only time will tell."

I don't want to spoil the surprise: start at the bottom, and work your way up.

How the other half lives. A user-post from Arrowhead Pride, but an interesting look at Pioli's stated philosophies (via War Room) and what Pioli has actually done. MLB drafts are usually considered more "best player available" where NFL leans toward "filling needs", but that didn't seem to be the case with the Colon pick, so there may be more similarities in MLB/NFL draft philosophies than we think.

Not really anything we didn't already know, but this is worth a note:
"SLEEPER ALERT: Humberto Arteaga, SS: Signed for just over $1 million in 2010 Arteaga is a strong defender with good range, hands and actions. He also has a solid arm. He doesn’t project to hit for power and he isn’t a stolen base threat so his offensive value will be tied up in his ability to hit for a decent average. He recently turned 18 and may spend another season in extended spring training before an assignment to short-season ball."

"A few months removed from the outfield, Sandy Garces has agreed to terms with the KC Royals as a LHP.."
(Didn't see this mentioned anywhere, figured it was something to note.)
"His trainer Leo Perez decided to place him on the mound due to his plus arm strength and feel for Curveball. Leo a former pitcher and CUBS farm hand cleaned his mechanics and thought him the fundamental approach of pitching. Sandy is now 17 years old, 6’1, 175lb, he sits 87-91mph with a feel for Curveball and Change-up. In a few DPL appearances Garces looked like he had been on the mound since little league baseball."

I just came across this site, but it is amazingly in depth. Do they know what they're talking about? Not sure. They have at least done a ton of legwork.

From 2001-Present, the Kansas Jayhawks have played an average strength of schedule of 29.25 (1 being the hardest and 120 being the easiest). From 2005-2009 during Weis tenure, Notre Dame played an average strength of schedule of 28.60. From 2005-2009, Charlie Weis had an averaged recruiting class of 13.60 and won 56.45% of his overall games. Over the last decade, Kansas has had an average recruiting ranking of 59.00.

The past doesn’t predict the future, and we can hope along with the Jayhawk nation that Coach Weis has learned what he needed to learn at Notre Dame to be a more successful head coach the second time around. However, the past does help us plan for the future, and By The Numbers, we are having a hard time planning for success with this hire.

Some skepticism, but he seems to generally approve:

Weis blustered his way beneath the Golden Dome, discussing the "decided schematic advantage" he would bring to the Irish. When Notre Dame won 19 games in his first two seasons, he appeared correct. When they won 16 games over the next three seasons, he appeared on the unemployment line.

Notre Dame, for all of its resources, is a familial place. After his fast start, Weis's ego veered toward imperialism. He burned bridges that he needed when his 2007 team fell to 3-9. He left South Bend a wiser man.
....
In the bigger picture, Weis is who Kansas needs.
....
Weis will bring Kansas a profile it didn't have under Turner Gill or his predecessor, Mark Mangino. Weis is good in the living room. His favorite verbal weapon is the needle, which is the Official State Figure of Speech of his native New Jersey. But his players play hard for him.

Mostly about the UK youngsters, but some bits about how KU played:
For most of the game, Kansas players with grown-man strength outmuscled [freshman Anthony Davis]. Thomas Robinson, a refrigerator-shaped forward, left him flailing on a predictable spin move, fifteen feet from the basket. On another play, Jeff Withey, the Jayhawks center, flicked Davis aside for an easy put-back dunk.

Some more insight into Melky and Sanchez, and their comparative values. The Davis comparison doesn't even make that much sense b/c he has several years of team control left.

We see this all the time when evaluating players and teams, but here's a Nobel Laureate discussing it in a non-baseball setting:
After meeting every Friday afternoon for about a year, we had constructed a detailed outline of the syllabus, written a couple of chapters, and run a few sample lessons. We all felt we had made good progress. Then, as we were discussing procedures for estimating uncertain quantities, an exercise occurred to me. I asked everyone to write down their estimate of how long it would take us to submit a finished draft of the textbook to the Ministry of Education. I was following a procedure that we already planned to incorporate into our curriculum: the proper way to elicit information from a group is not by starting with a public discussion, but by confidentially collecting each person’s judgment. I collected the estimates and jotted the results on the blackboard. They were narrowly centered around two years: the low end was one and a half, the high end two and a half years.
....
Then I turned to Seymour, our curriculum expert, and asked whether he could think of other teams similar to ours that had developed a curriculum from scratch. Seymour said he could think of quite a few, and it turned out that he was familiar with the details of several. I asked him to think of these teams when they were at the same point in the process as we were. How much longer did it take them to finish their textbook projects?

But extrapolating was a mistake. We were forecasting based on the information in front of us, but the chapters we wrote first were easier than others and our commitment to the project was probably at its peak....The argument for the outside view should be made on general grounds: if the reference class is properly chosen, the outside view will give an indication of where the ballpark is. It may suggest, as it did in our case, that the inside-view forecasts are not even close.

Giving players more money won’t solve the insubordination. We already have more money than we know what to do with.

A nice apartment in Blacksburg will cost roughly $450 per month, or $2,250 per semester. Purchase a Mega Flex meal plan for $1,459, and your meals are covered. With $5,533 in cash during the fall, this leaves athletes with $1,824 in extra spending money per semester, $364 per month, $81 per week or $12 per day. If someone can’t survive on $12 per day, when food and rent are taken care of, I question the admission process.

Interesting take on the lack of necessity for NCAA player stipends. My view is that players are being exploited without due compensation, but $38/hour makes it sound less unfair.

I had forgotten about the elbow problems - the reason he is confined to the pen - but his numbers were impressive: starter-quality stuff pitching in relief.

Is Kelly Johnson a good fit for GMDM's Process? Former Brave, veteran presence, fields relatively well (also a left-handed bat, something the system is short on). Maybe he's going to have several suitors, but maybe not. Not that I'm giving up on Giavotella, but this article is a good list of potential 2B candidates - the "Sleepers" section has some interesting possibilities. And also Beckham is an intriguing reclamation project - risky but certainly viewed as a talented player, and Seitzer would have his work cut out for him.

"I cried like an a**hole.......
by guilfordnd (2011-09-11 00:32:33)
"......for `15 minutes in the bathroom. and i[''m still drunk. I wanted to be as positive as I could the entire game until the pass. I crumpled up after that and cried and cried like I lost a good friend or some s--- after that pass. Tonight I let the small bluegill and two other panfish that were in my aquirium into the creek down the street. I figured I can't have anymore pussies in my man cave. I will catch some fish that will be a f---ing asshole ( like a bass) where every time I feed it it will dominate, and then s--- out the remains. call me wierd but I got nothing left. I don't know what else to do. I look forward to the fall but the gets harder and harder each year."

(Via This Week In Schadenfreude, one of my favorite weekly reads, as further example of unpleasant reactions to one's school's failings at college football.)

"Texas President William Powers Jr., athletic director DeLoss Dodds and women's athletic director Chris Plonsky were among a group of Texas officials who went to Oklahoma on Sunday....Oklahoma president David Boren was present at the meeting.
"In the meeting, Texas expressed its desire to keep the Big 12 together, while OU made it clear it plans to pursue membership in the Pac-12. But according to an OU athletic department source, Sooner officials agreed to wait as Texas works through its next move. It's OU's preference to go to the Pac-12 with the Longhorns, the source said, and OU is willing to wait for a short period of time while that remains a possibility before acting on its own."

(BtBS linked to this)
I am skeptical of many parts of this, and on several levels, but decide for yourself.

One excerpt:
And so when I think "Internet baseball fan," I think likemindedness. This isn't a criticism. This is just the way it is. A lot of Internet baseball fans have a lot of the same opinions. That is an unavoidable consequence of so many people looking at the same information.

"We're looking at how all batters faced have performed against a pitcher's handedness over the course of the season, and compare that to how well the pitcher actually did against these batters. An example...the set of batters that have faced CC Sabathia have hit for a collective weighted wOBA of .327 against all lefties, while the Cy Young favorite has actually allowed a wOBA of .280. "

Looks at individual pitchers as well as by-division and by-team. I suppose I don't need to tell you which team performed the worst compared to the expectations.