Editor’s note: Yahoo! Sports will examine the offseason of every MLB team before spring training begins in mid-February. Our series continues with the Kansas City Royals.

MLB Springboards: No. 30 Astros | No. 29 Marlins | No. 28 Mets | No. 27 Rockies | No. 26 Twins | No. 25 Pirates | No. 24 Indians | No. 23 Mariners | No. 22 Padres | No. 21 Cubs | No. 20 Brewers | No. 19 Red Sox | No. 18 White Sox

2012 record: 72-90
Finish: Third place, AL Central
2012 final payroll: $68.6 million

Estimated 2013 opening day payroll: $78 million
Yahoo! Sports offseason rank: 17th
Hashtags: #lukeofhurl #sal4mvp #burntends #performanceart #thriftstore #generationk #moralhazard #doublesmotheredcoveredchunked #foundationproblems #smoltzandbagwell

OFFSEASON ACTION

Since the last labor strike ended, the Kansas City Royals are either the worst franchise in baseball or a work of performance art looking to bring organic meaning to the idea of institutional incompetence. The Royals' win-loss

Read More »from No. 17 Royals: After decades of futility, Kansas City decides it's finally time to win now

Editor's note: Yahoo! Sports will examine the offseason of every MLB team before spring training begins in mid-February. Our series continues with the Chicago White Sox.

MLB Springboards: No. 30 Astros | No. 29 Marlins | No. 28 Mets | No. 27 Rockies | No. 26 Twins | No. 25 Pirates | No. 24 Indians | No. 23 Mariners | No. 22 Padres | No. 21 Cubs | No. 20 Brewers | No. 19 Red Sox

2012 record: 85-77
Finish: Second place, AL Central
2012 final payroll: $101.8 million

Estimated 2013 opening day payroll: $119 million
Yahoo! Sports offseason rank: 18th
Hashtags: #santajerry #danksyouverylittle #backloadedcontracthell #teachyourkidtoplaythird #mediocreville #greatsale #paulieballnuts #sinequanon #peaceoutaj #300obpprettyplease

OFFSEASON ACTION

On opening day last season, the White Sox carried a payroll of $96.9 million. Today they stand more than $20 million higher, and all they have to show for it is a 32-year-old who has gotten full-time at-bats once in his career,

Read More »from No. 18 White Sox: Tough for Chicago to prove last season's surprising run wasn't a fluke

Hall of Famer Stan Musial died Saturday at the age of 92 at his St. Louis-area home. (AP)

In St. Louis, one of the few places where they still treat their baseball like religion, a trip to the ballpark for Stan Musial was tantamount to a papal visit. Recently, only big occasions roused Stan the Man. He would slip on his Cardinals-red blazer – always Cardinals red – and a stadium of people would genuflect. Musial was their treasure, like one of those board games: For people ages 8 to 88. When Ford Frick called him "baseball's perfect warrior … baseball's perfect knight," he was exaggerating. Musial was never baseball's. He was forever St. Louis', forever the Midwest's.

Musial died Saturday evening. He was 92. Around the sport, they mourned the loss of a great player. Across the Heartland, they mourned something deeper, not just the passing of an icon but its perfect Midwesterner, from the seven decades of marriage to the earnest toot of his harmonica to the kindness that came naturally to the accomplishments being taken for granted because those East and West consider

Read More »from Stan 'The Man' Musial was perfect Midwesterner, 'perfect knight' for St. Louis

Editor’s note: Yahoo! Sports will examine the offseason of every MLB team before spring training begins in mid-February. Our series continues with the Boston Red Sox.

2012 record: 69-93
Finish: Fifth place, AL East
2012 final payroll: $168.6 million

Estimated 2013 opening day payroll: $155 million
Yahoo! Sports offseason rank: 19th
Hashtags: #kaboom #worstcontractoftheoffseason #titounplugged #hova #murderersno #papi #fakestreak #hungrymonster #willhitwontwalk #unlimitedtextingplan

OFFSEASON ACTION

The hot stove tally for the Red Sox, in descending numeric order:

- 126.45: Millions of dollars guaranteed to eight free agents.

- 99: Problems, but Nap's hip ain't one.Will the Red Sox's dugout turmoil continue in 2013? (AP)

- 39: Millions of dollars guaranteed to Shane Victorino, a 32-year-old coming off the worst season of his career and moving to a corner-outfield position when his bat cannot come close to carrying such a burden.

- 36: Walks in 59 2/3 innings last season from Joel Hanrahan, this year's crack at an established closer

Read More »from No. 19 Red Sox: Free of (most) awful contracts, flexible Red Sox still have questions

Editor’s note: Yahoo! Sports will examine the offseason of every MLB team before spring training begins in mid-February. Our series continues with the Milwaukee Brewers.

MLB Springboards: No. 30 Astros | No. 29 Marlins | No. 28 Mets | No. 27 Rockies | No. 26 Twins | No. 25 Pirates | No. 24 Indians | No. 23 Mariners | No. 22 Padres | No. 21 Cubs 

2012 record: 83-79
Finish: Third place, NL Central
2012 final payroll: $99.9 million
Estimated 2013 opening day payroll: $72 million
Yahoo! Sports offseason rank: 20th
Hashtags: #cuttingpayroll #dfw #hockingloogys #jekyllandweeks #tradeninjas #primewasting #nickjohnson #resplendentmustaches #lawrie #barrenfarm

OFFSEASON ACTION

Considering the Brewers last season led the National League in runs scored and were behind only the Rangers and Yankees in all of baseball, and seeing as their projected rotation included a No. 2 starter who until last year had nine career big league starts, a No. 3 starter with 29 career innings, a No. 4

Read More »from No. 20 Brewers: Ryan Braun's bat isn't big enough to overcome ragged rotation

Closer Rafael Soriano agreed to a two-year, $28 million deal with the Washington Nationals on Tuesday, a club source said, bolstering the bullpen of a team primed to make a run at the World Series a year after a late-inning meltdown ended its postseason.

The deal includes a third year for $14 million that vests with 120 games finished over the next two seasons.

By signing Soriano, the Nationals forfeit the 29th pick in the first round of the June draft and more than $1 million in bonus-pool money that comes with it. Closer issues ended the Nats' season last year. They hope Rafael Soriano is the remedy. (Getty Images)

[Related: How much did the Nats' payroll go up this season?]

The agreement shocked the sport not only because of its size – at $14 million a year, Soriano's average salary is the highest for a closer – but the concern that the loss of the draft choice would limit his market.

Following Mariano Rivera's season-ending knee injury last year, Soriano stepped in to the closer's role for the New York Yankees and saved 42 games with a 2.26 ERA. He opted out

Read More »from Source: Nationals get closer Rafael Soriano for $28 million, two seasons

Baseball's opening-day payrolls will exceed $3 billion for the first time this season, jumping more than 7 percent from last season and redistributing the windfall from landmark local television deals across the sport, according to a Yahoo! Sports analysis.

Using Baseball Prospectus' contract database, arbitration projections from MLB Trade Rumors and expected salaries for the remaining free agents likely to garner major-league contracts, Y! Sports estimates opening-day payrolls of teams' 25-man rosters will total about $3.15 billion, a 7.1-percent increase from last year's opening-day figure of $2.94 billion.

More than half of the increase comes from the Los Angeles Dodgers, whose projected $213 million payroll is the highest in the major leagues – and a 123.9-percent increase over their $95.1 million from opening day in 2012. The Dodgers signed the richest free-agent deal of the offseason, giving starter Zack Greinke a six-year, $147 million deal.The Dodgers have invested more than $60M on South Korean pitcher Ryu Hyun-jin. (Reuters)

The Miami Marlins, on the other

Read More »from Opening day MLB payrolls to exceed $3B for first time; Dodgers, Jays, Nats see biggest rise

Major League Baseball will test players' blood for human growth hormone during the season starting this year, becoming the first American sport to do so and continuing the league's stand against performance-enhancing drugs following decades of abuse by players.

Ex-Giants outfielder Melky Cabrera was suspended 50 games last season for PED use. (AP)Following a rash of positive tests for testosterone last season, MLB also will implement a new testing procedure for the synthetic drug, according to sources. The league will use a "longitudinal testing program" in which its testing lab in Montreal will maintain baseline concentrations of testosterone, epitestosterone and T/E ratio. The lab will compare those values to subsequent tests. If there is a statistically significant difference, the lab will scrutinize the sample with IRMS testing to see if the result was caused by a PED.

The league and the MLB Players Association agreed to the in-season testing after blood testing for HGH last spring. While the union had long opposed the invasiveness of blood testing, executive

Read More »from MLB to begin testing for HGH this season